From Church Leaders
on 28 July 2005 to ALMA Parish Rep at All Saints, Margaret Street
[Source: notes taken by Ian Leitch from St John Greenhill, Harrow]
Bp André opened with “Greetings to you all. It is a privilege for me to be here as the first Bishop of the Diocese of Angola. I wish to start by expressing our solidarity with you following the terrorist attacks in London.” He continued by saying that Angola knows what suffering comes in civil wars.
The good news is that Angola now faces peace after a liberation war that lasted 14 years, followed by 27 years of civil war - a total of 41 years of war that caused major devastation. Many people have returned to their homes to face very bad situations. Schools and health centres need to be restored. Many people live at a distance from existing facilities and cannot access either primary health care or basic education. The Church needs schools and must work at the grass roots. That way it can form and build up new churches. In Angola there are 120 political parties, although only seven of them are represented in the National Assembly. A general election is due in 2006 and the Church is working to show that elections need not lead to war.
Poverty is severe in Angola. The income of 70% of the population falls below the United Nations poverty line. Disease is widespread. An increasing number of people fall victim to HIV/AIDS, but malaria is the biggest killer. Mosquito nets offer good protection and are inexpensive, but many cannot afford them. The Church is trying to roll back malaria by training teachers how to promote the fight against malaria. With a population of 13 million people, Angola records about 360,000 deaths each year, of which 10% are due to malaria.
Between February and May this year the province of Uige in the north of Angola (and mainly the town of Uige itself) suffered an epidemic of the deadly Marburg virus (so named when it was first identified at a laboratory in Marburg, Germany in 1967). The virus rapidly causes internal bleeding and death can occur within a day or two. The disease is spread by any close contact with the victim. In Uige 360 people died, leaving 700 orphans. The outbreak began in the main hospital and spread quickly. Had it begun in one of the villages, it might have been more easily contained. Some cultural practices in Angola render the population more vulnerable to infection; for example, when someone dies, everyone who has known the person comes to kiss the corpse farewell. The good news is that this year companies in the U.S. and Canada announced that each had developed a vaccine for both Marburg and Ebola viruses that had shown significant promise in primate testing.
Bishop André described the Anglican Church in Angola. He had been appointed Missionary Bishop of all Angola - a single diocese for a country more than five times the size of the UK. At present, the diocese is organised into 48 parishes with 242 daughter churches. Some parishes and many daughter churches do not have any satisfactory building. The ordained ministry is composed of 38 priests and 4 deacons. Three ordinands are serving an “apprenticeship” in Mozambique and a further two men are training in Brazil. The Church is setting up its own local training scheme for ordination. ALMA has sponsored the translation of training manuals used in London into Portuguese, using words and idioms local to Angola. [The task is nearly complete, and the final document will run to six volumes and over 3000 pages.] The Anglican Church is very unevenly spread through Angola; ten priests are based in Luanda, the capital city, and every member of the church can receive Holy Communion once each week; further north the lack of priests means that it may be possible only once a month; and often the opportunity may exist only three or four times per year. A priority for the church is to plant new congregations in the north of the country and to train priests to serve there.
Construction of the bishop’s house is well underway, thanks to a generous donor. At present Bishop André is living in a completed annex. He looks forward to moving into the house and to receiving visitors. Bishop Graham Dow is visiting him in October and Bishop Michael Colclough is going to Angola in June 2006.
Bishop André was asked about evangelism in Angola. How is it working? The bishop responded that evangelism is at the heart of the whole work of the Church in Angola; all members must be evangelists who are willing by whatever means to teach those with whom they came into contact. Beyond that, the Church has trained and licensed 252 lay evangelists and looks to this group as possible candidates for ordination.
Asked what other religions were practised in Angola, the bishop replied that the vast majority of the population are Christians. Angola has over 900 Christian denominations (or sects), of which 67 are recognised by and registered with the government. A small Islamic community is composed mainly of migrants from West Africa. The other main Christian denominations are Roman Catholic (which has 15 dioceses), Methodist, Baptist, Congregationalist, and the Assembly of God evangelical church. The churches work together on a twelve-person committee for peace and reconciliation.
In Angola the Mothers’ Union is very strong and well organised. It ministers to the needs of orphans and the dispossessed. Angolans have large families, partly due to the very high mortality of under 5’s. The MU is effective in spreading the gospel as it advises younger women. The London-Angola MU link sends money for the purchase of sewing machines (made in South Africa, so that spare parts are easily available). It has also sent a banner to Angola.
When Christians in London wish to pray for their brothers and sisters in Angola, Bishop André suggested that they ask for three things:
Bishop André hopes that many more links will be developed between parishes in London and Angola. In closing the meeting, he gave a blessing in the words he would use when speaking to a congregation in Angola.