The Archbishop of Canterbury has called on secular development agencies to improve their understanding of faith-based aid organisations. Speaking on faith and development last night, Dr Williams criticised the secular approach for restricting development to the securing of universal human rights and economic liberation.
He argued that it was instead necessary to see development as “one aspect of a wider human liberation”.
“This is not, in other words, simply about the prosperous giving something to the poor, but about a gift that contributes to the liberation of both poor and prosperous and transforms both,” he said.
“If development agencies continue to learn how to relate intelligently to religious faith, the concept of development is less likely to be seen reductively as a matter of securing universal claims and more likely to be seen as one aspect of a wider human liberation.”
Dr Williams acknowledged that for this to happen, religious bodies also needed “a degree of humility and willingness to learn” about the causes of poverty and how to maintain credibility through “responsible and professional” practice.
The Archbishop was delivering the last in a series of lectures on faith and development, hosted by the RSA, the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, World Vision and other development-related bodies.
The Archbishop said a “long-standing suspicion” towards faith in parts of the development establishment had been accentuated in recent years by the “current nervousness about religious extremism”.
He admitted that the starting point for religious communities was not a doctrine of universal liberties and that they were “necessarily exclusive”.
“Of course, there needs to be a steady vigilance about proselytism, manipulative use of favours, exclusive focus on people of the same faith and other practices that distort the goals of liberation for a whole community,” he warned.
“The fact that these risks are sometimes exaggerated and are used as grounds for rejecting the whole idea of partnership with religious bodies should not blind us to the fact that the dangers are perfectly real.”
The Archbishop contended, however, that that the failure of faith groups to offer the same options as secular groups was “not invariably an impoverishment”.
He said: “'Franchising' development work to local faith groups or networks, partnering with such bodies on a long-term basis, can feel like a risk for governments or NGO's that have to preserve strict accountability for their electorates or donors.
“But equally, the embrace of partnership by religious groupings has to bring with it the readiness to embrace at least some patterns of accountability and effective delivery that may feel alien.”
He added: “There is risk and uncertainty for all involved, and a great need for good communication. But without this, the patterns of crippling mistrust will not be altered.”
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