On the weekend of June 15 & 16, St. Michael’s Parish will welcome Father Stephen Kow Bosomafi of the Dioceses of Sunyani, Ghana, West Africa. The paragraphs below are taken from a May 20th letter from Father Bosomafit to our Pastor, Father Joe Kutch.
Please permit me to give you a brief background of the Diocese of Sunyani, including some of its activities. The Catholic Diocese of Sunyani, Ghana, West Africa, was established in 1973. The Diocese covers an area of 19,500 Square km. Most of it is situated in poor rural areas, where most of the people are peasant farmers. These areas have lagged behind the rest of the country in education, basic infrastructure, and healthcare delivery. Because of this situation, the Diocese, when it was created, decided to make social development a major part of and tool for the evangeliztion of the people living in the diocese.
The Faith is relatively young. The faithful are mainly young families. They are mostly first- and second-generation Christians. In many areas, there is the need for primary evangelization. Fortunately, the response to the Faith is tremendously encouraging. The poeple accept the faith and join our local Church in large numbers. Some people tend to remain in the Tradiional Religion, but the young are accepting the faith. Thus, our congregation is mainly composed of young people. We have over 300,000 baptized in the Diocese. This number represents a third of those who attend the Church, but do not receive the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist for one reason or another
The Diocese believes in the holistic development of the human person. Therefore, it has made it part of its mission to provide some basic social development projects in areas where public socio-economic services are found wanting. Thus, it focuses on the following areas: primary evangelization, provision of safe drinking water, quality healthcare delivery, and eduation. In addition to preaching the gospel, we try to:
- Drill water wells to provide clean safe dringing water in our rural communities
- Establish schools at the grade, high school, and tertiary levels to provide quality Catholic education.
- Train and develop the leadership qualities of our local catechists who are at the forefront of our primary evangelization efforts.
- Open new parishes, which involves building new churches and rectories.
- Organize vocation rallies to promote vocations to the priesthood and religious life.
- Support the seminary education of our college seminarians; and
- Organize workshops on awareness and prevention of diseases such as breast cancer and screening, typhoid fever, HIV Aids, and many other communicable diseases through our health institutions across the diocese/region.
The coronavirus pandemic and the challenging economic conditions of the country has destroyed and halted almost all economic activities in the country. The diocese has been affected financially so much that we count on friends like you for support. Some of the funds we raise in your parish would be used to support the mission of the Diocese including the training of Priests and Religious. Currently the diocese has over 80 Major Seminarians at various stages of Priestly formation in different Seminaries in Ghana and abroad.