Α΄. The creation of the local clergy
The great missionaries of our Orthodoxy, Cyril and Methodius in the past and Saint Cosmas in more recent times, taught us that in order for the mission of the Church to be able to progress, it must have a local pastor.
The leaders of the missionary teams organize and coordinate the missionary work. The primary task of the missionaries is to create a local heritage. But it is the priests who continue the work of the missionaries.
It has been observed that, wherever there is a mission and new Christians are baptized, a pastor priest must be placed in the new church community. Where Christians were baptized and no priest was appointed, the Christians were scattered and the community was scattered.
The liturgical and spiritual needs cannot be met by the missionary himself, he must send a local native priest.
Β΄. Trained clerk
The clergymen who will serve the new missionary parishes should be trained. They should know how to pastor, be able to teach, catechize and love the liturgical life.
A good choice must be made and in no case will the criteria set by the Canons of the Church for the Priesthood be violated. Unworthy clergymen not only do not make a mission, they do harm.
Furthermore, missionary priests need training. Along with piety and zeal for God, they need training through a Seminary. They need to be taught the Bible, the Doctrines of Faith, Church History and Patristics, Pastoral, Catechetical, Liturgical, Speaking, the difference with Christian heresies, etc.
Above all, they need inspiration, vision and zeal, from the two thousand years of experience of the Holy Fathers-Shepherds of our Church and the living priestly examples they will have before them.
Γ΄. The heroic priests of Bukoba, Tanzania
I call the 36 priests of Bukoba heroic, because they kept the Orthodox Church in a period of great trial and abandonment, when for 10 years they did not receive any salary and were forced to turn to other jobs in order to support their large families.
In a meeting with the elders, they shed a black tear, recounting what they had gone through all these years of abandonment of the Diocese. They were not held in any esteem by the laity in the parish and the sanctuaries were literally flattened. They also had the mockery of the heterodox who mocked them for the poverty of the Orthodox Church.
I call the 36 priests of Bukoba heroic, because the 36 priests have to serve 190 parishes. That means that 1 priest has to serve 6 parishes. Many priests have 4, 5 and 10 parishes.
The Diocese is unimportant, since it has no priests.
From the very first moment of our presence in Bukoba, Mac. From the very first moment of our presence in Bkopkopko, since our Patriarch Theodoros, we have ensured our priests a monthly salary, with the generous sponsorship of the Holy Monastery of Vatopaidi. We gave each of the priests a motorcycle (piki-piki) and undertook the studies of their children in the two high schools of the diocese as well as in the higher schools.
For their training we organized a 15-day Seminar in February in Kasikizi and a 3-day Priestly Meeting in Bukoba after Easter.
We have set a goal and we have visited all the priests in their parishes and supported them in many ways.
Δ΄. Establishment of the Seminary School
The foundation of the Seminary is our next goal, by the grace of God and the Archbishop of our Church of Jesus Christ, dedicated to the founder of the Church of Africa, the “Apostle and Evangelist Marcus”, whose blessings we ask for.
The course of study will be two years and the Seminarians, 20 in each year, will be interns, with a daily liturgical schedule. There will be liturgical practice in the Church of the Annunciation, catechetical practice in neighbouring parishes and practical agronomy with the cultivation of the farm in Bouzi, for the supply of the necessary food.
Its headquarters will be in Bukoba, next to the Diocese, so that we can personally follow the training of our future priests. We will train them responsibly, intending to produce good Pastors-Missionaries of the local Church.
For the time being the new Seminary will be housed on the ground floor of the Diocese. For the immediate and better operation of the School, the construction of the kitchen, dining room and toilets has begun, with a budget of 10.000 euros. The operating expenses of the Seminary are planned for this year 2021-2022 at 2,000 euros per month.
The Holy Diocese of Bukoba is planning, together with the blessings of Mac. Theodoros, to erect the new building of the Priestly School in the courtyard of the Diocese of Bukoba. The budget for the construction of the new Seminary School amounts to 100.000 €.
Ε΄. Retrieved from
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, friends of the mission,
The needs in the Missions are great. We have prioritized them and thus proceeded to the most necessary and basic ones. The first and greatest need in the Mission is the presence of qualified priests. Without priests there is no Church and no Mission!
Help us to help our poor priests. Help us to train worthy priests-missionaries in the seminary. Help us build the new seminary in Bukoba.
With a worthy minister-priest of our Holy Orthodoxy in the Mission, we will offer both food for the hungry and medicine for the sick, since in our Church the souls and bodies are satisfied and healed!
In closing, I would like to thank heartily the Orthodox Foreign Missionary Brotherhood, which from my first visit embraced me and continuously supports the missionary work we are doing in Tanzania, around Lake Victoria.
π. Chrysostomos Maidonis
Patriarchal Commissioner
