Irish-British Province

KOLE/DR CONGO
Rebuilding the mission

Since 1999 Fr. Horst PETRY is the only confrere in the Diocese of Kole, where the SVD had cared for three parishes from 1981 till 1999. The diocese, in the heart of the vast jungles of Congo, is almost as large as Bavaria (66,000 sq. km.) and has about 300,000 inhabitants, of which 60,000 are Catholics.

In the beginning, Fr. Petry, together with a young diocesan priest, looked after the station at Dekese. Three years ago, the bishop transferred him to Kole, the diocesan center.

Fr. Petry describes the situation of his parishes: “I just returned from a three-week visit to three parishes with the bishop. We had to drive long distances on roads, which were wide enough for pedestrians and motorcycles. The grass on either side obstructed the view. Fortunately we had just one mishap, when the front wheel on the right rammed into a tree stump almost 25 cms. high. The tire withstood the impact.

From the first day seven motorcycles followed us with doctors and nurses, who often helped to push our jeep when it got stuck in the mud. The parishes are extremely poor.

The people have no means to market their products, although two rivers in the area are navigable. Thus they have no money to buy things, although they have enough food to survive. People are not able to maintain the church.

During the civil war (1998- 2003), the cattle of the diocesan farm were all eaten up by the soldiers and others. The furniture of the schools was used as firewood. It takes enormous amount of money and work to get things back to normal.

The bishop (who is a Franciscan) gets some help from Europe and the Franciscans for the most urgent needs. But the means available is just a trickle in the face of the mountain of needs to repair the damages resulted from the civil war.

The minor seminary is the best school around, but is in a very poor condition. The students sit on bamboo bars, write on roughly hewn boards and have to flee to drier places when it rains. Not all students have their own beds to sleep on. Worse still, they face the threat of lightning.

This year too, like the last year, many students needed medical attention after being struck by lightning. We want to install a lightning conductor to protect the buildings in the campus. But that may take a long time, as the material for it has to come from Kinshasa, about 1,500 kms. away. Until then the children have to live in fear of another lighting strike.

Source: Arnoldus Nota