I lived with this fellow for several years in Rome!
OTHER PONTIFICAL ACTS
VATICAN CITY, 18 JAN 2008 (VIS) – The Holy Father:
– Appointed Fr. Protase Rugambwa, official of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples, as bishop of Kigoma (area 45,056, population 1,679,109, Catholics 409,000, priests 70, religious 122), Tanzania. The bishop-elect was born in Bunena, Tanzania, in 1960 and ordained a priest in 1990.
Bishop-Elect Protase is a wonderful priest. Please pray for him. He comes from the area of Tanzania where all the strife is, the Great Lakes region. Tanzania is the poorest country in the world. In that zone of Tanzania hundreds of thousands of people streamed over the borders into those diocese, trying to escape ethnic persecution and genodice.
Please pray for him!
UPDATE: 21 Jan 2008 2317 GMT
I just got this from Bp.-elect Protase:
Thanks so much for your best wishes and I still count on your prayers.
Hope we will be able to meet before I go to Tanzania.
Protase.
He gave us the Internet Prayer in Kinyambo!
KINYAMBO (spoken in Tanzania)
Ensara otakatahile omu intaneti
Mungu owabushobola natalihwaho,
eyatutonzile Omurususo lwawe
kandi eyayenzile katuhiga byona ebili birungi, ebya mazima nebili kusemela,
nangu kulabila Omumwana Wawe wenka Omugonzibwa, Omukama weitu Yesu Kristu,
nitukusaba otubele,
kulabila omunsara zo Mutakatifu Isidore, Omwepiskopi na Daktari,
omurugendo lwaitu olwe intaneti
tutwale emikono yeitu hamo nameiso omubintu ebili kusemela ahali Iwe
kandi tubakolele ne ngonzi hamwe nokwetohya abantu abotulikutanganwa nabo.
Kulabila omuli Kristu Omukama weitu. Amina.
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God grant him many years!
Dear Blessed Tansi, please pray for His Excellency Bishop Rugambwa. Amen.
I’m really glad to hear we have a good new bishop in the Church!
Fr. Protase Rugambwa! Not to worry! The Lord is one who’s providing and permitting. May He continue to bless you according to the perfect intercession of the Immaculate Conception. Amen and amen!
Wonderful news! :)
I read through that entire prayer and even though I could make out only six or seven words I felt some afiniti to a human family that speaks such a language. Truly every language is a miracle of the Holy Spirit: the very idea that minute alterations in sound can be messengers of meaning. Awesome. Somehow I could picture Adam and his descendants, and some of them scattering to different parts of the world and defining their own way of life and – always – using LANGUAGE: that marvelous instrument that sets us apart from beasts. Homo incipit cum lingua. Amina!
May the Good Shepherd teach Bishop Protase Rugambwa how to guard and guide his flock, and give him the strength and skill to bring them all home to the fold. And may his flock make Kigoma become a place of love, learning, truth, prosperity, and peace. Amen.
Ad multos annos!
The last names of people in that part of East Africa are not family names or surnames – but are chosen by the family at the time of their birth. So for example I knew two African priests called Fr Narcisio Byaruhanga. “Byaruhanga” means pleasing to God.
Bishop-elect Protase Rugambwa was born on 31 May 1960. Just a few months before on (28 March 1960) before the Bishop of Bukoba, Tanzania (on the shores of Lake Victoria) was made the first African Cardinal of modern times. His name was Laurean Cardinal Rugambwa.
Quite clearly in 1960 Bishop-elect Protase’s parents named their baby son after the new Cardinal. I do hope they are still alive and are able to attend their son’s episcopal ordination.
CORRECTION TO TYPOS ON ABOVE COMMENT
The last names of people in that part of East Africa are not family names or surnames – but are chosen by the family at the time of their birth. So for example I knew two African priests called Fr Narcisio Byaruhanga. “Byaruhanga” means pleasing to God.
Bishop-elect Protase Rugambwa was born on 31 May 1960. Just a few months before (on 28 March 1960) the Bishop of Bukoba, Tanzania (on the shores of Lake Victoria) was made the first African Cardinal of modern times. His name was Laurean Cardinal Rugambwa.
Quite clearly in 1960 Bishop-elect Protase’s parents named their baby son after the new Cardinal. I do hope they are still alive and are able to attend their son’s episcopal ordination.