| Cardinal Keith Patrick o'Brien |
Cardinal Keith Patrick O'Brien, Archbishop of St Andrew's and Edinburgh, discovered on a visit to Kenya that the Church is vibrant and hopeful in
A Troubled Land
I have just returned from spending the first week of November 2009 in Kenya at the invitation of the Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. It was indeed a fascinating visit to a country which is suffering from various serious difficulties at this present time and a visit which gave me an insight into the tremendous ongoing apostolate of our Church in that beautiful country.
One of the major difficulties of which I soon became aware was the legacy of the tribal unrest that occurred nearly two years ago in particular areas of Kenya. In places I visited that had suffered because of the unrest, many families have been devastated through the death or mutilation of loved ones. Countless homes have been destroyed and families are forced to abandon their homes and farms and live in other locations where work is unavailable.
I visited parishes where priests and sisters spoke of having to open their churches and compounds to vast numbers of people who came to them out of sheer fear during the occasions of unrest. I visited a government-run camp holding about 7,000 people described as an IDP camp (for internally displaced people). There I found a near sense of hopelessness with conditions rivalling those which I had witnessed some few years previously in Darfur in Sudan which then as now was described as the “world’s worst humanitarian disaster”.
The other devastation being visited upon Kenya as on other countries in Africa is that of HIV/AIDS. Very many people are afflicted and of course considerable numbers are HIV positive. In a prison which I visited the Governor allowed me to speak to over 200 men gathered together in one of the halls. I think I spoke in an appropriate fashion about hope; but for me the most moving part of the visit was when the Catholic visitor to the prison asked the Governor if I could meet with those men who were HIV positive and who literally had no hope either for themselves or their families and I was able to bless each one of them individually. I found a tremendous openness among people who were HIV positive and this was shown in various ways at open air entertainment provided for me after the Mass to inaugurate some of the facilities being extended by the Franciscan Sisters and the Voluntary Missionary Movement (VMM).
Another increasing worry among people whom I met concerned climate change. People indicated that the rainy seasons were not as they used to be; and the spectre of horrible starvation and drought at present in areas of Kenya with the loss of many lives was in danger of appearing elsewhere.
The role of the Catholic Church in Kenya is considerable and I think increasing. I met one of the Bishops in the area which I was visiting, Bishop Philip Anyolo of the Diocese of Homa Bay and, at the time, Apostolic Administrator of Nakuru. Unfortunately Bishop Emanuel Okombo of the Diocese of Kericho had to be in Nairobi during my visit to his diocese. The vocation situation is very positive and I was invited to celebrate Mass with over seventy students at the pre-seminary dedicated to St Mary in Molo. These were fine young men aged between 17 and 38 who were being directed by four resident priest staff before deciding eventually or being chosen for the National Philosophy College or the Theological Seminary. The same method of training is used by the Kiltegan Fathers who have a national house of formation in Nakuru which involves their pre-seminary spiritual years before all of their students proceed to study philosophy in South Africa and then all go together to a Theological College in Nairobi. Incidentally, I met a great variety of Kiltegan Fathers, some mature in years having given a lifetime of service to the Church in other parts of Africa or indeed in Kenya itself. All the Kiltegan Fathers whom I met were very fruitfully employed in ongoing missionary work, handing on the faith to the present generation and ensuring that their own missionary work would be continued by a succession of Kenyan priests working either in Kenya itself or in other areas of Africa or indeed throughout the world. One other interesting development which I visited was a house of prayer founded by the Kiltegan Fathers on the outskirts of Nakuru which is used for retreat goers as well as providing days of recollection both for the Kiltegan Fathers and for the local clergy.
At a Mass which I celebrated on All Souls Day at the Convent of the Franciscan Sisters in Molo with a great variety of missionaries present, I spoke on the death and awaited resurrection of so many wonderful people who had been our predecessors in the missionary field. I spoke of this same death and resurrection occurring both in our Church at large as well as in religious orders and congregations at this present time. As indicated, the Kiltegan Fathers are certainly aware of the Resurrection‚ in their training for the priesthood in Kenya and indeed throughout the world. Following on the considerable drop in vocations experienced in Ireland and in other first world countries, the Kiltegans have established their own training centres within Africa and for African students to become missionary priests. This does indeed show the vitality, not only of the local Church, but also of the Kiltegan Fathers in the ways in which they have adapted to their present situations. I was also more than impressed at the tremendous involvement of laywomen and laymen sharing in the charisms of the Kiltegan Fathers as also in the charisms of other religious orders and congregations. The Church certainly seemed to be vibrant and alive to the missionary challenges still existing in Kenya, in Africa as a whole and elsewhere.
I left Kenya with much hope in my own heart for the Church in that country, realising a tremendous awareness of problems which are being faced but also aware that the Church and its members are tackling them with a will.
TRAGIC AFTERMATH
Little did I think when I met Father Gerry Roche in Kenya at the beginning of November, that I would be attending his funeral in his native Athea, Co Limerick less than two months later. When I met Gerry in Kenya he was so happy and fulfilled. He was one of the many missionaries, women and men, whom from your first meeting with them you felt that you had known them all your life. I first met him at the Mass in Molo which I described above. He also celebrated Mass with me when we dedicated the various projects under the auspices of the Franciscan Sisters which are funded from Scotland under the broad heading of “Live with Hope”. He later invited me to celebrate a Mass in his own parish, Keongo, at which I dedicated parish catechists. It was obvious to me that Gerry was known and loved by all. Afterwards he took me to the site of a proposed convent where he hoped to establish a community of Franciscan Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. It was not to be. Gerry was brutally murdered in his house on the morning of the 11th of December.
I pray now with so many who knew him and loved him that he himself will be experiencing that glorious resurrection from the dead for which we had prayed together with fellow missionaries on All Souls Day. And may his resurrection continue to help the people of Kenya and all of the peoples of the world to rise to that new life of Jesus Christ in the era to which we look forward at this time, that era of love, of justice, of compassion and of peace.
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