AMECEA: Cleric Ready to Nurture Re-integrated Child Through Holy Childhood Association

Sr. Jecinter Antoinette Okoth, FSSA

After the re-integration of Tiffany (not her real name) from St. Martin Children’s Home back to the relatives in Kitwe town, Ndola Diocese in Zambia, a cleric has promised to nurture her spiritual life through the Holy Childhood programs offered in the parish to ensure the girl finds her bearings.

“This is the best move for children being brought up in institutions. They need to grow up in families,” Fr. Andrew Ngosa the parish priest for Wusakile parish in Zambia’s Ndola Diocese shared with AMECEA Online Wednesday, on May 15 after reintegration of a child stressing, “I will make sure that I follow it up and my support system will be the Holy Childhood group.

Holy Childhood is one of the four Pontifical Mission Societies in the Catholic Church, dedicated to fostering children’s awareness of the missionary nature of the Church with the motto “children helping children.”

According to the member of the Order of Friars Minor Conventual (OFM. Conv.), the children’s association is robust in Wusakile parish, and the group will strengthen the faith of the young Tiffany who has been baptized and is yet to receive the Sacrament of the First Holy Communion.

“We have a strong Holy Childhood program in the parish with strong animators and vibrant children. We have a special Mass for this group on Sundays where the children animate the Mass: they sing and take the readings on their own,” the cleric who has served in Wusakile parish for four years said in an interview and continued, “I will make arrangements and ensure that this girl joins the group.”

Fr. Ngosa who admitted witnessing child reintegration for the first time in his life, acknowledged that the entire process was enlightening and it reminded him of the many seminars he has so far attended on child protection and family apostolate.

“We need to encourage such reintegration processes where children are taken back to families, and the same families are strengthened to understand their role in shaping children’s well-being in society,” the Zambian cleric said and added that families should not only look after their children within the nuclear family but also to support children from extended families not to find their way into institutions.

The re-integration process was organized by the Association of Member Episcopal Conferences in Eastern Africa (AMECEA), in collaboration with the Association of Sisterhoods in Kenya, (AOSK), and the Zambia Association of Sisterhoods (ZAS).