Vicariate Apostolic of Ingwavuma

From our Archives

Fr. John, a former Provincial of the Eastern Province, U.S.A., is a Professor of Canon Lawyer. He is presently teaching Canon Law in South Africa.

St. Alexis Priory, Merrivale, is a formation community of the Inter Southern African Conference, which consists of Servite jurisdictions of Swaziland/Ugan­da, Zululand, and Mozambique. It is associated with St. Joseph's Theological Institute in nearby Cedara. There are twenty in the community this year. Six members are temporary professed studying theology - four from Uganda, one from Zululand (Raphael Ntsele) and one from Mozambique. Of the ten pre-novices, who study philosophy at St. Joseph's, two are from the Zululand Vicariate (a South African and a Zambian); five are from Uganda; and three are from Mozambique.

As it has done every year for the last three or four years, during the month of November the priests of the Vicariate met for the Annual General Meeting at St Lucia. Fr Mandla Msweli was in charge of welcoming everyone with a braai on Monday evening.
Our first session was led by Fr Gabriel Afagbegee SVD. Born in Ghana he has been the director of LUMKO Institute for many years. He helped us all work on a vision for the Vicariate. As Fr Andre Cotton OSM put it during the morning: "A vision without actions is a dream, actions without a vision ... a nightmare!". We are all working hard and we risk forgetting we need a vision that will gather us all making sure it does not become a nightmare!
Fr Gabriel put a few questions to us in order to clarify where we see ourselves in this moment: Where are we now as Vicariate? How would we describe the pastoral structure of the parishes? What are the positive aspects we see? and what is it we are not happy about and we would like to change? What resources do we have at our disposal? Which resources we would need to have?

Friday October 19th dawned rather murkily. It had rained for most of the preceding week, and appeared to be following the same pattern. But by 10 o'clock the sun had pushed it's way through, and for the next few hours it remained bright and warm, if somewhat soggy. It seemed the people were not coming, and on the Friday of a wet week, would that be surprising?

By 10 o'clock, however, they were trickling in, and at 10.30 there was a sizeable congregation.

The memorial Mass was beautiful, celebrated by the bishop with 11 priests, Servite, diocesan and visitors. Our new deacon, ordained just 6 days earlier, performed all the deaconly tasks with great aplomb. The choir of Malusi Omuhle primary school led the singing with sweet enthusiasm, conducted by Sr Anna Rose. Fr Declan Doherty gave a short homily in English for the benefit of the overseas visitors, Dity's sister Renate and friends Gerd and Brigitte Reichenbach. Fr Mandla Msweli pre

ached in Zulu.

On Saturday 10 November, Star of the Sea High School (KwaNgwanase, KZN) celebrated the visit of Mr and Mrs Nasch. It was the first time they visited the school. A few months' ago, the Heribert Nasch Foundation donated 15 computers to the school helping them in this way to start their Computer Lab. It had been the wish of Mrs Miya (Principal of the school) and the Servite priests of the Parish that one day Mr and Mrs Nasch would visit the place.
Though they had never been in the area Mr and Mrs Nasch reached the school early on a Saturday morning. The principal and the students were ready to welcome them. They had prepared traditional dances and speeches.