Pope John Paul II Journal of Philosophy

African philosophy as a disciplinary movement (Onebunne, 2024) is love of African wisdom, (Iroegbu, 1994). It is a critical reflection on African lived experiences. More so, inculturation is all about integration of faith and culture. It has to do with bringing ones culture into ones faith. It is a contextual embodiment of belief in one’s way of life. In sum, African philosophy of inculturation is a critical integration of faith within African lived experience. However, in this paper, African philosophy of inculturation as African philosophy of indigenous engagement or African philosophy of contextual meaning critically articulates a reflective and symbiotic union between African traditional worldviews and the critical task of interpreting faith, knowledge and social life within concrete cultural contexts. Rooted in African tradition and culture, inculturation affirms the African Weltanschauung. The researcher, nevertheless, finds that African philosophy of inculturation is a holistic vision of reality characterized by a contextual turn in afromodality1 as versed in communality, relational ontology, sacred inter-relatedness of life, connectedness of realities as one and continuity between the visible and invisible worlds. African philosophy of inculturation also responds to the historical marginalization of African religion and culture under colonial and Eurocentric dominance. As a hermeneutical framework, African philosophy of inculturation enables the contextual reinterpretation of faith and appreciation of foreign religion in ways that resonate with African tradocultural values and existential concerns with transformative insights grounded in African experience, oriented towards the communal well-being and human flourishing.

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