AMECEA: At Silver Jubilee, Blessed Bakanja Seminary Launches Magazine, Intends to Use Media for Evangelization
Clergy and seminarians during the 25 years of Bakanja
Sr. Jecinter Antoinette Okoth, FSSA
Seminarians of Blessed Bakanja AMECEA College (BBAC) launched a new magazine dubbed “The Angelus” as the seminary marked 25 years of its existence on Saturday, October 21, to promote the use of media; print, broadcast, internet, and social media for evangelization which is the key mission of the Church.
Blessed Bakanja Seminary located in Kenya’s capital Nairobi, was established in 1998 as an inter-regional seminary bringing together young men from the eight-member conferences of the Association of Member Episcopal Conferences in Eastern Africa (AMECEA) region and beyond to have high-quality formation to the priesthood.
Narrating the initiative to come up with the first edition magazine which was to mark the Silver Jubilee of the seminary, Seminarian Eliud Kinyanjui the chief editor for “The Angelus,” noted that the seminary came up with a journalism club at the beginning of 2023, to spearhead the realization of this long-term dream.
He said that the inspiration to evangelize through the use of media traces back to when the Vatican convened the first special assembly for Africa (African Synod) in 1994 and discussed the significance of utilizing social media and other sources of communication to evangelize to all the people of God across the globe.
The 1994 synod, stressed the need for the Church to take heed to various aspects of media use including; paying attention to both modern and traditional media, the power of the modern means of communication, and the media world as both subject and object of evangelization.
Additionally, besides the Africa synod, the seminarians are equally responding to the Vatican’s document Communio et Progressio (the pastoral instruction on the means of social communication) that was released at the direction of the Second Vatican Council to help deepen understanding of the teaching and spirit of the Council and guide Christians in their attitudes to the media after the publication of Intermerifica; a document addressing the concerns and problems of social communication.
According to seminarian Kinyanjui, a second-year theology student at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA), the club which intends to have an annual production of the magazine, currently has “a total of 10 members, representing various dioceses within the AMECEA region.”
Why the Magazine is dubbed as “The Angelus”
As the magazine was being launched on Saturday by Archbishop Philip Arnold Anyolo, the chairman of the Seminary Commission of BBAC, and the Local Ordinary of Nairobi Metropolitan See, the Kenyan seminarian of the same Archdiocese explained that as the Angel Gabriel announced the good news of the Nativity of the Lord, (Luke 2: 10-11), “the name of the Magazine was extracted from the prayer of the Angelus, with the hope to proclaim the good news to the communities around the seminary, to dioceses, and to announce about the seminary itself.”
Seminarian Kinyanjui disclosed further that the future editions of the magazine will cover a diverse range of content, including: “Reviews of Papal encyclicals, the Theological reflections, the role of cultural diversity in evangelization particularly in the AMECEA region, topical issues and news relevant to the region as well as insights and reflections on seminary experiences especially on the journey and growth of seminarians.”
