ZAMBIA: ZCCB Expresses Pastoral Solidarity with Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops
Zambia Catholic Bishops
The Zambia Conference of Catholic Bishops (ZCCB) has expressed its pastoral solidarity with the entire membership of the Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops’ Conference (ZCBC) and in particular, Most Rev. Robert Ndlovu – the Metropolitan Archbishop of Harare.
Recently the Catholic bishops in Zimbabwe accused the Zimbabwean government of carrying out human rights abuses and cracking down on dissent, prompting a swift denial by President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s administration which described the allegations as “evil” and baseless.
In a pastoral letter, the Zimbabwe Catholic Bishops’ Conference said the country was suffering from a multi-layered crisis including economic collapse, deepening poverty, corruption and human rights abuses and that fear runs down the spine of many of people today as the crackdown on dissent is unprecedented.
In a solidarity statement, the ZCCB president Rt. Rev. George Lungu said that the Catholic Bishops of Zambia applaud the courage and prophetic role Zimbabwean Catholic bishops played by issuing the Pastoral Letter entitled That March is Not Ended.
“We do hereby acknowledge and applaud the courage and prophetic role our brother bishops played by issuing their recent Pastoral Letter in which they respectfully urged the government of Zimbabwe to pay particular attention to the economic and political crisis the country is facing,” Bishop Lungu said.
“As ZCCB, we share the pain the majority of Zimbabweans including the Catholic Bishops are experiencing at the moment. This is so because we are all members of one family of God, the Church. As St. Paul the Apostle put it, “If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. Now, you together are Christ’s body ” (1 Cor 12:26-27),” he added.
The ZCCB president further said that they pray that the government and people of Zimbabwe will not abandon the noble agenda of pursuing the path of true and genuine dialogue aimed at resolving the challenges they face.
“We, on our part, shall continue to pray for a peaceful end to the crisis in Zimbabwe. We encourage our sisters and brothers in Zimbabwe not to lose hope because God has never and will never abandon his own,” he concluded
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