African Church is facing hard times - Mbarara archbishop

Mbarara Archbishop Paul Kamuza Bakyenga

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Archbishop Bakyenga asked priests to concentrate on teaching the gospel and leave the things of the world to be done by the congregation.

ISINGIRO. Mbarara Archbishop Paul Kamuza Bakyenga expressed concern over the future of the Catholic Church in Africa if Christians do not pray for priests to remain committed on their work of serving God.
Archbishop Bakyenga was yesterday presiding over the perpetual vows of seven sisters, celebration of Silver Jubilee of four nuns and Golden Jubilee of eight nuns in the convention of sisters of Our Lady of Good Counsel of Mbarara at Kyabirukwa in Isingiro District.

“As Catholic Church, we are becoming stronger in Uganda. As the population increases, people bring us a lot of trouble. Like nowadays politics is at its peak and there are also things of social development calling for us. But the word I want us to go with is, the religious should join hands and pray for our priests. I know you have always prayed for them but continue praying for them because where we are going, there are a lot of big challenges,’’ Archbishop Bakyenga said.
He said there are many temptations that distract priests from carrying out the duties assigned to them by God and even some members of the congregation will try to fail them.
“Our forefathers were backsliding for instance Simon Peter felt overburdened by Jesus issues and decided to go back and fish, such temptations still exist. There is danger in our African Church,’’ Archbishop Bakyenga said.

He added: “Paul was teaching that what we are teaching cannot be seen but it has value. If we stop praising and reading the Bible to explain it, even if you give out posho and beans, it is not what God asked us to do.”
“The religious should pray for us, pray for us so that we do not spend much of our time giving out posho and other things because in our congregation, there are people who can supply posho better than us. I think it is the right time to carry out discernment [ability to judge well],” Archbishop Bakyenga said.

He added: “The late 60s and 70s were very bad years for the Church, my schoolmate, whom I was ordained with as a Deacon and he was becoming a priest, we always held hands and encouraged each other to be strong but I want to tell you that by 1978 he left and married a Scottish sister. When I was studying in Roma as a priest, I visited him and when I went there as a bishop his wife told me that if I was a woman she would kill me because her husband would not spend a day without talking about me. That was my classmate who was a priest, he left after five years.’’

Set your priorities
Arcbishop Bakyenga asked priests to concentrate on teaching the gospel and leave the things of the world to be done by the congregation.
“I am saying that since we have decided to follow our Lord, we should know our priorities in the Church. We are starting schools and universities. Let us educate people who will give out posho and others. We should not leave our job of praying. As an African church, we know how to dance, sing we must know how to preach and how to pray so that we can get more saints for our people to follow,’’ Archbishop Bakyenga said.