The Pope has invited Burkina Faso’s president to the Vatican later this month to see what can be learnt from the West African nation’s example of religious tolerance. BBC Africa’s Lamine Konkobo is from Burkina Faso and assesses if this can continue in a region under assault from Islamist militant groups.
Religious tolerance has long been wired into the social fabric of my country, with many people drawing their faith from more than a single creed.
The Islam practised by many Burkinabe Muslims – who account for about 60% of the population – would be considered blasphemous by Salafists, as they include many animist practices.
My own father was not born a Muslim. He converted to Islam in the 1970s as a result of his business dealings with El Haj Omar Kanazoe, a rich trader from the Yarse sub-ethnic group known for their affiliation to Islam.
While my father chose to become a Muslim, setting his children up to follow in his footsteps, the rest of his family remained animist and my father could not disown them for that.
In the neighbourhood where he chose to set up his household, he was under the tutorship of his maternal uncle, a patriarch named Yandga who was the custodian of the village’s fetishes.
Anywhere my father looked, even if his new co-religionists urged him to hate, he could not have done so without losing his soul.
Like many others across the country, he had to adapt to the dynamics of society around him by accepting that Islam was not the only way.
As children, we grew up with people with differing religious beliefs – playing together, being told off by each other’s parents, celebrating each other’s festivals, mourning each other’s deaths, with humanity as the overriding connector common to all.
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