SW News: Despite being an impoverished nation in southern Africa with the lowest Gross National Income, the Church in Malawi is quite vibrant and it has got 23 new transitional deacons on Saturday. The seminarians who received the diaconate hail from two archdioceses and six dioceses. They will be serving in various parts of the landlocked country in south-eastern Africa until they are ordained as priests.

Bishop Peter Adrian Chifukwa of Dedza Diocese during the diaconal ordination Mass gave a Homily explaining the dire situation of Malawi. He said that it is facing acute poverty, which has even affected the running of the Church.

Owing to the crisis, he made an appeal to the faithful saying that the number of Catholics is going up and to commensurate priests accordingly people will have to support young seminarians and their formation. Only then the priests could be assigned to various churches.

The bishop also explained further saying that earlier funds used to come from overseas and now since the external funding has stopped, the Church in Malawi is forced to rely on the magnanimity of its believers, or else it would be difficult to continue with the process of priestly formation.

The Bishop of Dedza added, saying that it requires a lot of money for a seminarian to complete his education to become a priest. He also appealed to families and all Catholic faithful to mould young men in their respective parishes to respond to God’s calling to the priesthood.

News portal Malawi24 quoted Deacon Rev. Tobias Mkweu from Mzuzu Diocese as saying that he was happy that all of them were moving towards priesthood and asked the Catholic faithful to pray for him and his fellow deacons.

The site also quoted one of the parents of the new deacons Anastanzia Theu as saying that she was overwhelmed witnessing the ordination and prayed that God keeps guiding them till they become priests. Unlike permanent deacons, transitional deacons will be ordained as priests once their formation period is over.

Malawi ranks 173 out of 182 countries on the Human Development Index and more than 1 million Malawian children are orphaned due to AIDS. Out of a total population of 17.6 million, 77.3 per cent are Christians while Catholics are 17.2 per cent.