ZANZIBAR: Interreligious Dialogue and Solidarity Commission Needs to be Emphasised during the forthcoming AMECEA Plenary Assembly, says Catholic Bishop of Zanzibar
Zanzibar Bishop Rt. Rev. Augustine Ndeliakyama Shao, C.S.Sp. has proposed Interreligious Dialogue and Solidarity Commission as key issues to be considered for deliberations during the forthcoming 19th AMECEA Plenary Assembly in Addis Ababa Ethiopia in July 2018.
Coming from a diocese where Islam is the main Religion with just a handful of Catholic population that barely make 1%, Bishop Shao feels disappointed that the issue of Interreligious Dialogue has not been given the emphasis it deserves adding that, the issue of solidarity with the dioceses and countries where Catholic Christians are the minority also needs to be looked at to strengthen the activities of the Commission of Solidarity at AMECEA
“Previously there was strong Pastoral care to the Nomadic Communities in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, this ensured that people who move from one area to the other were well taken care of in terms of their pastoral needs and something needs to be done to reawaken it.” Bishop Shao said in an interview with AMECEA Online News in Zanzibar.
He observed that there is infiltration of activities of other Religion in the most dominated Catholic areas and such activities are often geared towards luring Catholics to abandon their faith.
“You can say that as Bishops we are not aware of what is happening; but the reality of the amount of land being bought by Muslims for the erection of Mosques is just alarming, the reality of how other denominations are spreading as whirlwind sweeping along our Catholic faithful is alarming. I might be wrong in that but if you consider the universal trend on how the Muslims are moving very fast even to predominant areas of Christians then there is a reason for us to do something.”
Bishop Shao mentioned his birthplace in Kilimanjaro Rombo where there was no single mosque but now the situation is totally different as numerous mosques have been built.
“So one may wonder that what are the priests doing, what are the Bishops saying, I am not saying that other religions should not flourish in our turfs, but it is a caution that we should strengthen our Christians in their faith through deeper evangelization.” Bishop Shao said adding that it is high time AMECEA considered serious deliberation on interreligious dialogue to come up with resolutions that can form the basis of tackling the infiltrations.
“Let us not only do the beautiful paper works, we come from these international meetings and we discuss a lot of important issues, come up with beautiful ideas, but at the end of the day, the implementation of those ideas remain the prerogatives of the individual bishops. Is he ready to implement it, is he ready to execute it? That is my big concern. He said
Equally important is the issue of solidarity, according to Bishop Shao, the AMECEA Commission for Solidarity needs to be in the forefront to reach out to the dioceses and countries facing persecution. He explained that when his diocese faced the atrocities from the Muslims in 2012-2013, he had 15 priests at that time and they were scared because of the propaganda that the Islamic fundamentalists were looking for priests and religious sisters to assassinate and the priests suggested to him to consider possibility of doing exchange with other dioceses.
“They said that we who have been working in Zanzibar for 20 years, 15 years, 12 years can do some exchange with dioceses in Tanzania Mainland in order to debrief. I said my brothers, this has come at a wrong time, at this time everybody is scared of Zanzibar and if I bring this idea to the conference it will not be taken because the bishops are not going to force their priests to come to Zanzibar. Nobody will want to come here so let us persevere.” He explained saying that deep inside he expected more solidarity and so were his priests.
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By Pamela Adinda, AMECEA Online News
