Catholics Celebrate Mass at Stadium

Catholics of the Gambia and their Bishops, Archbishops, Cardinals, Priests and representatives from the English-speaking West African countries recently converged at the Independent Stadium in Bakau, to celebrate the Holy Mass under heavy rains.

Members of the Plenary Assembly and Workshop of the Association of Episcopal Conferences of Anglophone West Africa (AECAWA), met to 'bury' their association and to praise God.

The young and the old in their "Ashobi" gathered together in a faith-taking at the Independence Stadium, occupying both covered and uncovered pavilions. Many others joined them to praise God and to celebrate unity in diversity.

His Eminence, Peter Cardinal Appiah Turkson, Archbishop of Cape Coast, stated "On this visit, we bring blessing to this land, Jesus Himself became a migrant. We hear about young people drowning in the sea, people die to go to look for money in the other countries, leaving diamonds at our backyards that are later cut, polished and sold; and the white man comes to pick those diamonds behind our houses and go with them to make money out of them."

Most Rev. Peter K. Sarpong, Archbishop Emeritus of Kumasi, Ghana recounted bringing about of the AECAWA.

"All regions had their regional bodies from North, Central, East and South Africa, but the West did not have it except for the French. We met together in 1977 at Ibadan to form AECAWA that had connection with only English speaking West African countries. We met in all countries and the last one was in Freetown and this is the final one before we move onto RECOWA, which will encompass both French and English-speaking West African countries. He said they set up commissions to deal with different aspects, including social communication.