By Dominic Kapatamoyo, Malawian
Wednesday the 25th November was a great and joyful day in our Jerusalem Small Formation Group (SFG) and the entire St. Anne’s Community. Together with my three classmates: Patrick Sebyera (Congolese), Olivier Ndayikengurukiye (Burundian) and Simon Chege Njuguna (Kenyan), I took a further step with the Society of the Missionaries of Africa by renewing my Declaration of Intent and receiving the ministry of the Acolyte. It was a very beautiful celebration with about 70 participants. The Mass was celebrated by our confrere, Archbishop Michael Fitzgerald, M.Afr, who happens to be one a member of St. Anne’s Jerusalem community.
In his homily, Archbishop Michael pointed out the meaning of being an acolyte: helping the deacon and to minister to the priest and distribute Holy Communion as an auxiliary minister. I was profoundly touched in my heart when we sang the song, “Here I am Lord, is it I Lord, I have heard you calling in the night, I will go Lord, where you lead me, I will hold your people in my heart”. Indeed, here I am Lord, I have come to do your will.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank all you, especially our SAP Provincial Council who accepted me to renew my Declaration of Intent and receive the above mentioned ministry. May the Good Lord continues blessing you all and our beloved SAP Province. I thank you so much for your prayers and support in my missionary journey.
Wishing you all a good and fruitful Advent season as we wait the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us prepare our hearts to receive him well. My best regards to you all.
My dear Friends, Greetings! I hope you are well. Today, as you receive this NEWSLETTER, most of us M.Afr are travelling to Merrivale, our house of formation, for two great celebrations. Indeed, six of our candidates will take their Missionary Oath tomorrow, Friday, and thus become fully fledged Missionaries of Africa. The following day, they will be ordained deacons! After their last year of theology, sometime toward the end of next year, they shall be ordained priests in their respective parishes of origin. But this being such an important occasion, some of their relatives have travelled to attend these two great events. Already yesterday, the parents and a nephew of our Tanzanian deacon-to-be, Konrad, arrived from Dar-es-Salaam. This afternoon, I will be driving with them to Merrivale. The others are Albert from Burkina Faso, Alphonse from Rwanda, Robin from Zambia, Damian from Uganda and Douglas from Kenya. I hope that we will have one or two good photos of them in the next Newsletter. You may be asking yourself “What is a missionary oath?” Well, here is a short explanation. We, Missionaries of Africa, are not a “religious congregation” as such. We are a “society of apostolic life” and we also live the three evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience; but we do not take vows. We promise to live a simple life style (poverty, or freedom from things), obedience to our superiors (freedom to serve), and chastity (freedom to love) in our missionary oath – which is a solemn promise on the Bible. Here is an extract of the text of our missionary oath: “… I promise and swear to the Superior General of the Society fidelity and obedience… to observe celibacy for the sake of the Kingdom.” I therefore ask you to keep in your prayers these six new Missionaries of Africa.
I hope this month has been a blessed one for each of you. In spite of all the upheavals happening in the world, the students’ strikes and violent demonstrations, we can see some positive signs of life here and there in our society and throughout the world. Pope Francis is now in Kenya since yesterday. His coming to Africa – his first one – is under the sign of hope and peace to our broken world. Everywhere he goes, he brings a refreshing touch of joy, the joy of the Gospel. Let us pray that his visit in Kenya, then in Uganda and finally in the Central African Republic will sow seeds of peace among these nations of Africa and at the same time, be an inspiration to the rest of the world.
