Identify Two Important Aspects of Ubuntu Theology: Reflection on Bishop Tutu The most basic meaning of Ubuntu theology is humanity. Ubuntu means humanity and is related both to Umuntu, which is the category of intelligent human force that includes spirits, the human dead, and the living and to Ntu, which is God's being as metadynamic, active rather than metaphysical. (p.39) African philosophers employ an African concept of personality called Seriti (plural, Diriti), which identifies a life force that makes no distinction between body and soul. (p.50) God's creation is seen both through the lens of Ubuntu, as an African influence, and of ‎Kenosis (p.60), in which God's love redeems creation through the outpouring of the divine ‎life made known in Christ. ‎ The first important aspect of Ubuntu theology is that all humans are born with potential, a God given potential to see God in oneself and to see the same God in all other people leading to unconditional love and interdependence between all peoples. Tutu's model of Ubuntu claims that human identities are interdependent in such a way that any one person's survival is dependent on the survival of all others. (p.159) Ubuntu proposes an alternative to reprisal and retaliation and retribution because it provides an invaluable ‎perspective in which white and black and all other racial configurations people may see themselves as other than racial rivals.‎ When you look at someone with eyes of love, Tutu believes, you see a reality differently ‎from that of someone who looks at the same person without love, with hatred or even just ‎indifference.‎ This concept is understood in a community-based framework of people networking one with another. Viewing others with the eyes of love immerses one in the reality different from that of someone who looks at any other person with hatred or indifference, which is a byproduct of apartheid. It is only through an understanding of universal human networking and cooperation that people can understand how God's image encourages diversity in a hostile world. Implicit in this theology is the understanding that humans do not develop their potential in emptiness but only in interdependent community transactions, giving and sharing, and are uniquely made to be more supportive than cutthroat summoning all persons to realize their need for one another. For Tutu, then, racial distinctions matter only insofar as they demonstrate God's phenomenal ‎creation, in which interdependency is the outcome.‎ The second aspect of Ubuntu. The second aspect of Ubuntu, the consequent accomplishment of Ubuntu, lies in the establishment of the church in the world. Tutu's austere preparation leads him to take action through the church to support corrupted forms of human societies to see the truer image of God (p.161). This newness is clearly expressed in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ when God broke the frantic cycle of death and effected salvation (p.164) by proclaiming that the greatest commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself. In this light, Tutu's distinctive Ubuntu theology, formed out of his African culture and the Anglican theology of the church, emphasizes the discipline of Christian personality within the church community. (p.124). The very nature of God related in three persons becomes the Christian paradigm of Ubuntu. Aggressive schemes of power cannot be tolerated, and no longer can deterministic ideologies fix human identity, because the Christian God is always creating anew. (p.164). Imago Dei. The pinnacle of Ubuntu theology and the systematic theology which is proposed in Battle’s book is an emphasis on the integrity of creation and ‎the habitual recalling of our image of God (Imago Dei) in the midst of human conflict. (P.4‎). Here, racial ideology as demonstrated and defined in apartheid is inconsistent with any forms of Christian faith, hope, and charity to one’s neighbor irrespective of a person’s national origin, sexual identification, color, theological position, creed, and any other factor designed to elevate one group higher than another group causing inequality, hatred, and social divisiveness. The absolute focal point is dependence on God and neighbor created in God's image, our common Imago Dei, viewed through ubuntu as Imago Dei, ‎‎ the absolute locus of one's identity. (P. 46‎) Race, then, cannot be a person's most important basis of personality because personality comes from the Imago ‎Dei, a spiritual truth possessed by every human being.‎ Tutu aims to stir his culture toward a model of understanding in which racial and cultural differences are no longer to be found in a hierarchy of power. ‎" By implication, accepting the premise of the Imago Dei demands a high view of the human capacity ‎to know God, and it testifies to the essential goodness of creation”. (p. 127) Consequently, ubuntu would reject the definition of a black or white church since it gains its definition historically by being in opposition to either white or black identity and, ‎therefore, lacks the ability to model the Imago Dei. (P.168)‎ Several 20th century theologians also discover the Imago Dei as a focal point of theological investigation and research. In his treatise on Baptism, Rahner states the following. We believe that holiness is always the work of Christ. Because we are by nature divided, torn between two opposing tendencies in us, the decision making the selfless triumph over the selfish tendency within us is God’s merciful doing in us. Wherever a man finds in himself the freedom to renounce his self-centeredness and give way to a selfless concern for another, what happens to him may be described as a dying unto himself and a raising to a new life, liberated from the connatural ambiguity of his own striving. Since a victory is the work of grace, we may justly describe what happens to such a person as a share in the death and resurrection of Jesus, in other words as a kind of baptism. In some way, however tentative and faint, the image of Jesus has been imprinted on that person. Edward Schillebeeckx reflects the same conclusion. I find it difficult to imagine that a sincere militant communist atheist possesses not one shred of authentic theist faith. Anonymous religion can take many hidden forms. Wherever there is some sense of justice, truth, and above all genuine brotherhood, there is God too. God does not leave himself without witness. His grace seeks out all men. (Acts 14: 16-17 17:22-30) Reconciliation: Many people are leaving the Episcopal Church who are in disagreement with the certain positions ‎regarding statements and holdings of the Episcopal Synod of America concerning the ordination of ‎persons of differing personal backgrounds. Here there is a scriptural lack of trust in the decisions of ‎Bishops who, with complete good conscience and moral integrity, approve those persons that they ‎judge to have a vocation from God to be fitting and committed priests and deacons in the Episcopal ‎Church.‎ ‎ This is a reflection of an historical phenomenon that has been evidenced in the Church since the ‎earliest days. Problems causing conflict between groups within the Church have been chronicled since the first Christian communities were formed. The early communities of Christianity demonstrated a great ambivalence about the relationship of ‎‎law and faith.‎ Custom lived out in everyday routine governed Christian communities, not a body of written law.‎ It was custom conversant with oral traditions and sacred scripture.‎ Christians did not put their lives together according to a Christian law but according ‎to ‎the spiritual goals of the community and of individual Christians.‎ St Paul wrote to Roman Christians who knew and lived under the law created ‎by ‎the Roman state and reminded them that reliance in Christ replaces worldly law ‎with a pursuit for ‎salvation (Romans 7:1-12 and 10:1-11).‎ Christianity and our own Church will become more highly developed by appreciating the practices that are ingredient to faith, practices of learning, forgiveness, shared aims with the underprivileged, benevolence, diplomacy, total comprehensiveness, and entrenched trust in God. These practices may be the required foundations for understanding the tradition of faith and the actual world we live in. Law cannot make a man worthy to ‎God; only ‎faith can bring life to the just man.‎ The inherent tension between the faith and conscience of the individual ‎and the ‎rigor of law has never been and never will be completely resolved ‎in religious law.‎ We have repeatedly observed and felt that Tutu aims to stir ‎his ethnicity toward a representation of understanding in which racial and cultural differences are no ‎longer to be found in a hierarchy of power.‎ One defined group cannot seek control and power over another group distinct from themselves, especially within the same church, by condemning them and then theologizing their own position as Mahan did with apartheid ‘s pseudo theology that was inherently immoral. Karl Rahner. Encyclopedia of Theology: The Concise Sacramentum Mundi. (New York: Seabury Press, 1975). V.1., 146. Edward Schillebeeckx, World and Church: (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1971). 32-33