2015-02-09 18:01:00

SECAM Bishops wind-up a successful visit to the Vatican


SECAM completes engagements at the Vatican and in Rome

Members of the Standing Committee of the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM) have wound-up their week-long trip to Rome, Italy. During their visit, the SECAM Bishops were received in audience by Pope Francis. They also met several Vatican officials and held a press conference to conclude their visit.

SECAM Director of Communications, Benedict Assorow, told Vatican Radio’s English Service for Africa Monday 9 February, that the SECAM Bishops and the Ghana-based secretariat staff were returning to Accra satisfied after successfully completing all their engagements in Rome and the Vatican.

Invitation to Pope Francis to visit Africa

The SECAM leadership of Bishops, at the weekend presented to Pope Francis a message on the current situation of the Catholic Church in Africa.

The Bishops also invited Pope Francis to Africa, this year and in particular to SECAM’s 19th Plenary Assembly which will be held in Uganda in the year 2019. That Assembly will also mark the Golden Jubilee of the founding of SECAM.

SECAM visited Vatican Decastries

The delegation of the leadership of the Church in Africa that comprised eleven Bishops headed by the President of SECAM, Archbishop Gabriel Mbilingi of Angola, also held discussions with heads of a number of Vatican Decastries. The decastries visited included the Secretariat of State; the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples; the Secretariat of the Synod of Bishops and the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace. Others are the Pontifical Councils for Culture; Inter-religious Dialogue as well as the Pontifical Council for the Family.

The Bishops’ Standing Committee was accompanied to Rome by SECAM Secretary General, Fr. Joseph Komakoma and four senior members of staff as well as two consultants of the SECAM Secretariat.

New Episcopal Chair of SECAM Communications

In another development, the new Episcopal Chairman of SECAM Communications, Bishop Emmanuel Badejo of Oyo diocese, Nigeria, was officially introduced to the President of the Pontifical Council for Communications, Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli by the President of SECAM.

Blessed Pope Paul VI: "Africans, be missionaries to yourselves."

SECAM was officially inaugurated by Blessed Pope Paul VI in 1969 during his Apostolic visit to Uganda. It was at that inauguration in Kampala’s Lubaga Cathedral that Blessed Pope Paul VI issued that now important statement: "Africans, be missionaries to yourselves."

Ugandan Archbishop of Gulu and President of the Uganda Episcopal Conference, John-Baptist Odama told Vatican Radio’s English Service for Africa that, the general assessment since Blessed Pope Paul VI made that statement is that, “We have not fully lived up to the statement (of Blessed Pope Paul VI)”   According to Archbishop Odama, Blessed Pope Paul VI wanted Africans to share more of their personnel and resources for evangelization through the newly founded association of SECAM. In light of the Beatification of Pope Paul VI last year as well as the impending golden jubilee of SECAM, Archbishop Odama believes that the African Church needs to revisit Blessed Pope Paul VI’s Kampala statement and “see how we can implement it. It is homework that Africa still needs to implement,” Archbishop Odama said.

SECAM for communion and collaboration

The Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM) was intended as a body that would preserve and foster communion, collaboration and joint action among all the Episcopal Conferences of Africa and the adjacent Islands of the continent. Its secretariat is in Ghana

(By Fr. Paul Samasumo) e-mail: engafrica@vatiradio.va

Read here: Pope Francis’ full address to Members of the Standing Committee of the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM) when he met them in audience on 7 February 2015. http://www.news.va/en/news/pope-francis-warns-against-new-and-unscrupulous-fo

 

 








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