UGANDA: Episcopal Consecration of Msgr Wokorach is Postponed Indefinitely

Sr. Jecinter Antoinette Okoth, FSSA

Episcopal Ordination and installation of Bishop-elect for Uganda’s Catholic Diocese of Nebbi, Msgr. Raphael p’Mony Wokorach that was scheduled for Saturday, June 26, has been postponed indefinitely due to a spike in reported cases of Covid-19 in the country.

In a message shared with AMECEA online, the postponement of the consecration was “unforeseen,” and the Apostolic Nuncio in Uganda Archbishop Luigi Bianco has asked the Christians to continue praying for God’s intervention for the end of the protracted pandemic.

“Due to the current pandemic situation, the episcopal Consecration of Rt. Rev. Raphael p’Mony Wokorach…has been postponed,” reads in part the message from the Pope’s representative Archbishop Bianco and it adds, “We continue to pray for a better situation (and) in due time a new date will be communicated.”

According to Msgr. Wokorach a member of the Comboni Missionaries of the Heart of Jesus (MCCJ), the new date for Episcopal consecration will be dictated by the Covid-19 infection rate in the country.

“We shall be able to know the specific date when it is safe enough for people to gather in small or big numbers,” says the Bishop-elect who was appointed in the month of March while serving as the Pontifical Commissary of the Religious Missionary Congregation of the Apostles of Jesus (AJ).

The postponement of the Episcopal Consecration of the Comboni Missionary, comes days after the Uganda’s Head of State His Excellency Yowreri Kaguta Museveni orders 42 days lockdown across the country to stem the spread of the variant.

The new re-imposed measures include closure of all educational institutions, some bans on travel, shutdown of weekly open markets, and the suspension of public worship among others.

As of Wednesday, June 23, Uganda had registered 74,260 confirmed cases of Covid-19, with 50,085 recoveries and 752 deaths, and the President declared Friday, June 25, a public holiday for Covid-19 national prayers as a second wave of the pandemic continues to affect the east African country.

In an interview Thursday, June 24, with AMECEA Online, Msgr. Wokorach who had already travelled to Uganda awaiting the ordination disclosed that the ordination was duly set. However, he appreciates that this is a special moment which is “not a holiday but a grace-filled moment of preparation for something important without such a push which many people do not have.”