Our family were very honoured to join in a major celebration
in the local community recently. Charles
and Mary are the parents at the kids home here and on the 21st April
their son, Edwin, was ordained as a catholic missionary priest.
What a well organised awesome celebration it was! We spent Saturday at a local Catholic church
where there was a massive crowd (a few thousand) to join in this special event. There was a real balance between reverent
liturgy and ancient ritual mixed with vibrant and joyful African dance. The clothes, the choir, the dancing and the
joy was awesome. Boy do they know how to
party! There was food and sodas for everybody and though we left in the late
afternoon, the celebrations went on late into the night! There was so much that impacted me about this
occasion. I was explaining to the boys
that we will probably never experience anything like that again in our
lifetime. I loved seeing the massive
crowd dancing round whilst carrying Edwin on a real crowd surf – I have never
seen that at an Anglican ordination back home!
It moved me deeply to see Charles and Mary give him away near the
beginning of the service, a real sense of them letting him go to the
church. Later Edwin prayed his first
blessing over them as a priest, very touching.
The Bishop who had just ordained Edwin knelt before him and Edwin prayed
a blessing on him too. We have really enjoyed getting to know Edwin
in the last few months and he has such a servant heart so it was amazing to see
all the years of work and preparation come to fruition on this day.
The celebrations continued the following day when Edwin was
welcomed to his home church in Timbwani as a priest! We joined the dancing procession round his
car who danced him along the road singing, dancing and celebrating with
him. Once again a huge crowd gathered to
be there for the first time Edwin gave mass.
Soon Edwin will leave to serve in Spain.
They will be blessed to have him though he will really be missed here by us and many others.
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