Catholic Pontiff, Pope Francis has laid down
an ultimatum to defiant Nigerian priests;
lose your job if you don’t obey me and your
bishop.
Pope Francis met with a delegation from
the Ahiara diocese, on June 8 at the
Vatican. The delegation from the diocese is
an area where priests have been refusing
to accept the 2012 appointment by the
then pontiff, Benedict XVI, of the local
bishop.
Defending the pope’s unusual harsh order,
Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano,
said that Francis was acting “for the good
of the people of God” by threatening to
suspend the priests from the ministry if
they didn’t pledge in a letter, by July 9, “total
obedience” to Francis and accept Bishop
Peter Okpaleke’s appointment.
According to Associated Press, Pope Francis
told the visiting delegation he was “very
sad” about the priests’ refusal to obey and
ruled out tribal loyalties as explaining the
refusal.
Africa has been one of the continents
where the Catholic church is growing. The
faithful and clergy there often imbue their
practices with local culture in dynamic
contrast to more traditional routines in
Europe or North America.
Pope Francis’ move to end disobedience to
the Vatican aims at ensuring the growing
church there will be loyal to the pontiff.His
remarks to the visiting delegation indicated
how dangerous he viewed any rebellion
against papal authority. “Those priests
opposing Okpaleke’s taking up of his office
want to destroy the church, which is not
permitted” Pope Francis said in his address
to the delegation.
He also demanded that each priest in the
diocese write to him asking forgiveness
and clearly manifest total obedience to the
pope. or run the rsik of loosing their
current office. “They must also accept the
bishop chosen by Rome. If, within a month,
each priest doesn’t do so, he will be ispo
facto suspended, such as from the
celebration of the sacraments, and “will
lose his current office” Francis warned.
Francis acknowledged that his move
“seems very harsh.” He added that he had
even considered the extraordinary remedy
of suppressing the entire diocese but
didn’t, so as not to hurt rank-and-file
faithful. He said he thought the rebellious
priests might have been manipulated from
outside the diocese or even abroad, but
named no culprits.
In 2015, the diocese served around
520,000 Catholics, out of a local population
of about 675,000, and had 128 diocesan
priests and seven other priests. It wasn’t
immediately clear how many of the priests
were involved in the rebellion against the
bishop’s appointment.
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