MARSHALLANS MUST ARISE TO PROTECT THE CHURCH – REV. FR. PROF. AFFUL-BRONI
A CALL TO UNITY, CHARITY FRATERNITY AND SERVICE:
THE ROLE OF THE MARSHALLAN
Rev Fr Prof Anthony Afful-Broni, PhD; Catholic Chaplain and Pro-Vice-Chancellor, UEW, Winneba, July 1, 2017
The Supreme Knight,
Supreme Council Members,
Most Respected Ladies,
Worthy Brothers and Respected Ladies,
Brothers and Sisters,
Beloved in Christ Jesus;
I wish to begin this presentation by thanking the Almighty God for His manifold blessings on all of us, on our great nation Ghana, and on the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church to which we all belong.
I would like also, to thank especially the Regional Grand Knight, Worthy Brother Charles Nuoriyee, the Regional Noble Lady, Respected Lady, Sister Charity De Souza and the entire Accra East Regional Council, for this very kind and warm invitation.
I may not have the official and legal recognition and qualifications, but in spirit and deep within my soul, I truly feel like a brother Knight, and pray that I will be one before I am too old to be considered.
Please allow me to also use this unique opportunity to thank you, as a family and as individual proud and passionate Catholic Knights and Ladies, for coming in your numbers, to patronize and participate in this important Annual Conference. I pray the Good and Gracious Lord to continue to abundantly bless and keep you as the apple of His eye.
Please, let me thank you as well, for responding to the invitation of Our Lord, who, in Mark 6: 13 told his disciples:
“Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest”,
for there were so many coming and going that they did not even get the chance to eat.
Beloved,
It is true that you have not had time to rest because you have been tasked with so many responsibilities at work, at home, at church, in the community, so much so that you hardly have time to relax and think about your Christian journey, the most important dimension of your life.
You are a husband, father, grandfather, uncle, cousin, brother, colleague; You are church president, catechist, choir master, board member, doctor, lawyer, or judge,
You are mother, gramma, auntie, sister, wife, member of parliament, lecturer, medical doctor, managing director, basic school teacher, engineer, architect, assemblywoman …
Your days and weeks and months and years and decades are so packed you wonder if you can even have rest. As for leave or holidays, you can’t remember the last time you had one.
Today, the Lord Jesus has invited you to come to this lovely venue, at this important Conference, to rest and be with him. You have been invited to be with Him through the Mass that was celebrated, through the lovely brother knights and sisters in the Noble Order, and you will, if you choose, hear Him speak to you through your unworthy servant who stands before you this morning.
My very dear brothers and sisters in Christ, I wish to commend especially the organizers of this unique programme for the good planning, and specifically for the choice of this theme: A Call to Unity, Charity Fraternity and Service: the Role of the Marshallan.
In my view, this theme is an invitation to you, to examine the very core of the Noble Order of the Knights and Ladies of Marshall. I think that this theme is a call to each one of you to soberly reflect on the very fundamental agenda that every Marshallan is destined to consider.
Beloved,
A call to Unity, Charity, Fraternity and Service is a call to consider one’s membership of this Noble Order, and how one is living it out.
Considering the times in which we find ourselves, and the fact that the theme is capturing the very motto of the Noble Order, I find this conference’s theme very appropriate, dearly beloved.
As you know, The history of the Noble Order which initially had only Catholic men, known as the knights, dates back to 1925 when some 13 young men of St. Paul’s Catholic Church in Sekondi, came together to form a society for the purpose of bringing together Catholic men for effective lay apostolate and Catholic action. Their intention was to get the Catholic men more actively involved, even at that time, in the new evangelization which they had seen the great need for; these founding fathers were keen on the passionate spread of the Word of God and the execution of the vision and mission of the Holy Roman Catholic Church.
In fact, one would tend to agree with Sir Knight Anthony N. N. Baffour, PSK, SC, PRGK, PGA when he says that the founders of this Noble Order were a step ahead of the Second Vatican Council! Isn’t that amazing? Again, as you know, the Noble Order also aimed at providing a forum for Catholic men, who otherwise would have joined non-Catholic secret societies like the Freemasons and the ODD fellows which were springing up in the cities of the Gold Coast and whose teachings were against the Catholic doctrine, life and practices.
Desirous of making things happen for the lay faithful at that time, those 13 young men made enquiries as regards the history of the “Knights of Columbus” a fraternal Catholic society of influence in the United States. They found out that whilst the “Knights of Columbus” exists as a fraternal organization, it also immortalizes the name of a layman, Christopher Columbus, the “discoverer” of America.
Inspired by a similar spirit, the young men decided to set up a fraternal society that would immortalize the memory of Sir James Marshall, who championed the re-establishment of the Catholic Church in the Gold Coast (Ghana) by Fr. Auguste Moreau and Fr. Eugene Murat (SMA Fathers from France) nearly 250 years after the first attempt by the Portuguese in 1482. It was to immortalize the name of such a great soul that the founders named the Society after Sir James Marshall; hence the name “Knights of Marshall”.
Not too long afterwards, the Ladies wing of the Noble Order was also founded.
Dear brothers and sisters in the Noble Order,
I wish to reiterate my great admiration for you individually and as a Society, for striving to be just like your founding fathers. By planning, and by coming together, and by choosing this theme, you are clearly demonstrating your commitment to the very foundations of the Order, and you are showing how desirous you are to be faithful and loyal to Holy Mother Church.
Your motto Unity, Charity, Fraternity and Service is expected to ginger and catalyze your collective effort to attain the aims and objectives of the Noble Order, and thus help build you up spiritually as well as enliven the Holy Catholic Church. I salute you for faithfully, throughout these 92 years, striving to inculcate into your members, loyalty and fidelity to Ghana and the Catholic Church.
I thank you for working to honour, defend, promote and live the Catholic faith; I commend you for endeavouring to promote and enhance fraternal Catholic spirit, both by personal and group action in all phases of life. I bless you for doing your best to support and promote Catholic education. You have played significant roles in our continuing fight to have our mission schools returned to us, so that we can more fully help educate our youth in the faith and tenets of the Church.
I am proud of you for maintaining a fraternal order of Catholic lay leadership, through which you are preparing your members to more steadfastly play leading roles in the Church.
I thank you for helping, in your own small ways, many individuals, to develop spiritually. After all, heaven is our eternal destination and home.
I commend you for quickly coming to the aid of members and other families in periods of emergency, bereavement, illness and other needs. I am proud of you for your vision in spearheading programmes that are providing economic sustainability, liberation and progress for your members, the Church, and humanity.
The Supreme Knight,
Supreme Council Members,
Most Respected Ladies,
Worthy Brothers and Respected Ladies,
Brothers and Sisters,
Beloved in Christ Jesus;
You have come together this morning, with the desire to reflect more on your motto of:
Unity
Charity
Fraternity and
Service
UNITY
In a world whose people are becoming more and more individualized, self-centered and inward looking, your call to Unity is even more relevant, essential, and urgent.
Whereas by Unity, Marshallans are called to be united for a just cause, for the Church; to help lift the image of the Church, fact is that there are many examples of the image of the Church being dragged into the mud by many contemporary false prophets who also claim to preach Christ; these false prophets seem to find everything wrong with our doctrines, faith and practices. Some preach boldly at some of our many FM stations; others are regular on TV station; some are writing falsely against the Church and spreading same fast on social media. Other so-called men of God are sponsoring revivals and crusades at university campuses.
My dear Christian friends, I am convinced that as Marshallans, it is time to be more united in your zeal to help lift up the image of the Church through more passionate revivals, to help set the records straight, and to spread even more the Catholic faith.
Specifically, I wish to recommend strongly the establishment of a vibrant TV station to be fully owned by the Noble Order, with the blessing of the Ghana Catholic Bishops Conference.
I do know that as individuals and as Society you are major sponsors of the Catholic Digest. But again, my honest observation and candid view is that looking at our size and potential as a Christian denomination in Ghana, the Catholic Digest is simply not enough. Although we are deeply grateful to our Bishops Conference for this initiative, I have no doubt that if the Noble Order of the Knights and Ladies of Marshall in Ghana came together to propose the setting up of a vibrant TV station, the Bishops Conference would give it their resounding blessings. As a practical aspect of our motto, let us seriously consider this recommendation.
I am looking at a Ghanaian version of EWTN, but this time, it must not be, like the many things that we replicate in Ghana, a mere carbon copy of EWTN; it must be fully Catholic but originally Ghanaian, so that it can be most relevant, grounded in our Ghanaian context, and informed by Ghanaian Catholic perspectives, so that it will be best embraced and patronized by a vast majority.
This TV station will be well planned, and executed, with fully qualified Catholic administrators, technicians, journalists, theologians and reporters running it.
FRATERNITY
Brothers and sisters in Christ, I believe you will agree with me when I state that the famous and enviable African communal spirit that we used to pride ourselves in is fast fading away from among our communities. The fact that for example, orphanages keep springing up almost everywhere should be worrying to us. If these children’s parents are deceased, and interestingly a good number of the residents of the orphanages are not even orphans; where are their uncles, aunties, cousins, and other members of the extended family?
As if this is not enough, I am also hearing that in some cities, people are establishing nursing homes/ homes for the aged. Like the West, we Ghanaians seem to becoming individualized and self-centered. We are splitting up the beautiful Ghanaian/ African community, and we are disposing of our aged, as we bring them to these nursing homes!
In the name of modernity, globalization and civilization, many Ghanaians, including Catholics, are fast running away from our traditional communal practice of large numbers living together at our compound houses. Let us look at our architectures of the 1950’s and 1960’s, compared with those of today. Please take a look at the large family compound houses which we see in Adum, Asafo, Tafo, Manhyia, etc., compared with the modern architectures found at other parts of Kumasi which are newer.
Our observation is that this is happening in every other city, town or village. Even in our small villages, we can notice this general difference between the houses built in the past compared to the ones being built today.
Our modern houses are no longer African or Ghanaian. There are no longer any rooms in our modern homes for gramma, uncles, aunties, nieces, nephews and cousins!! And there are no common gathering areas for all, as we have them at the traditional compound houses.
Not too long ago, Chinua Achebe wrote:
“A man who calls his kinsmen to a feast does not do so to save them from starving. They all have food in their homes. When we gather together in the moonlit village ground, it is not because of the moon. Every man can see it in his own compound. We come together because it is good for kinsmen to do so.”
What happened to our community spirit?
As Marshallans, my dear friends, you are invited to help remind us that even before we became Christians, we were a community, and we believed in fraternity. Let us do more to rekindle this spirit, which is also Christian and Catholic.
Another sad occurrence in our communities today is that whenever people observe any unusual or unacceptable behaviour, fewer people are willing to stick their necks out to call others to order, to correct, to support, reconcile, or help them live more fully.
In our Churches, few people are willing to provide feedback to their colleagues or their priests even when there is the need.
With such a bleak picture, what responses would you like to come up with, to help bring hope, my dear Marshallans?
CHARITY
My dear friends in Christ,
Under charity, the Marshallan is called upon to show pity to others, sharing with them even the very little they have. This call is to show genuine concern to anyone who may be in need. The parable of the Good Samaritan comes to mind, and the Marshallan is invited to see neighbour in every child of God who is in need.
Here again, I salute you, beloved in Christ, for you are quite well known for the many activities, throughout your years, and across the nation, in the Church, and outside the Church, in the area of Charity, where you have continued to show pity to others, especially the needy and vulnerable in society.
Holy Spirit Catholic Church at UEW is a proud beneficiary of the many works of Charity done by this Noble Order.
As I commend the Order for their amazing performances in this area, I would like to ask individuals to reexamine how well they are doing in their own spirituality as far as this area is concerned.
So goes my question; Are we doing enough as individual Catholics by way of Charity?
Where we find ourselves, in our parishes, chaplaincies, places of work, residential areas, are we active, generous, involved as we should?
When we realize that our youth are drifting out of the church in their hundreds and thousands, are we doing enough to help them find solace in the Catholic Church? Or have we simply pointed accusing fingers at our priests as we simply looked on apathetically?
The Noble Order has done quite well to cater to the spiritual and moral growth of the youth in the Church by the introduction of the Junior Order. One may wish to know if the programmes which guide their activities are good and sufficient enough.
Of course I must mention the many acts of charity that our many convents and seminaries, especially the major seminaries, have enjoyed from the Noble Order over your 92 years of existence.
I wish also to commend the Order for being a courageous Christian voice on the condemnation of societal evil, the latest being the killing of the Late Major Mahama.
While thanking you for this act of charity, of courage and call to order, as well as many others in the past, I would like to invite you to let us look more closely at our woes as a nation.
Can we come out more powerfully to address what is even more fundamental to those atrocities surrounding us today?
- loss of a greater sense of rightness and wrongness
- loss of sense of mentorship, parenting and general sense of leadership
- loss of a sense of consequence – cause and effect
- waning appreciation for the sacredness and value of life in all its forms
- loss of a sense of ownership of and relation to the environment.
- loss of responsibility for our future kind
- abuse of a good sense of sanitation and general cleanliness.
If we act unconcerned, as generally seems to be the case, we shall all be at greater risk very soon, and there will be no future for us and our younger generation.
(Youth at play on Sunday morning.)
Let us continue to get more involved!
SERVICE
As Marshallans, you have pledged to offer yourselves in service of the Church and humanity. Specifically, you make yourselves available to the Archbishops, Bishops and Priests of your various dioceses and parishes.
No wonder, most of you have been and are playing extremely important roles in the church’s life.
Church Council Chairs
Members of Parochial Councils
Church/Diocesan Boards
Governing Boards of most Catholic and non-Catholic Institutions.
It therefore comes as no surprise that most of the national, diocesan and parish awards/recognitions given to our lay faithful go to Marshallans in the country
Let me go further by encouraging you to continue and to expand these great efforts of rendering valuable services in the Church and Nation.
I pray that soon, there will be more Marshallans who come out to run for public office, to help inject more Marshallan and Catholic Spirit into our Ghanaian life. It is not by accident that in the league of high performers among SHS in Ghana, Catholic Schools are always, consistently over 20 years now, among the top, and form over 90% of best performing senior high schools in Ghana
I know that there is a Catholic group among our parliamentarians. I wish to challenge more Marshallans to offer themselves in nation building so that soon we shall have the league of Marshallan Parliamentarians.
The league of Marshallan Judges
The league of Marshallan Doctors
The league of Marshallan Nurses
The league of Marshallan Professors
The league of Marshallan CEOs
This will certainly transform Ghana, no doubt about that.
CONCLUSION
Chairman for the occasion, Supreme Council Members, Brothers and Sisters, I wish to conclude my presentation with the following comments:
I am very proud of you, members of this Noble Order, for holding fast to the faith of your forebears. You have remained steadfast to the Catholic Faith, defending the Church in good times and in bad. Holy Mother Church salutes you!
You are still like your founding fathers, who were ahead of Vatican Council II. By planning to meet and examine your core values, you are demonstrating eagerness to remain true and relevant to your Christian calling. And so you are, perhaps ahead of the Catholic Church in general, in her urgent need to arise and re-examine herself amidst the many threats that she faces.
Clearly, you have come to that conviction that heaven is our final home, and we each must do all that is within our power to prepare ourselves to enter there.
For you and me, we are fully convinced that our membership in the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church puts us at a good place to work out our salvation, and eventually reach heaven.
Even as I commend you for the many fine things you do, in preparing to attain your salvation, I wish to encourage you to never relent in your onward walk to heaven. Please do not ever become complacent.
Even as preachers such as Dag Heward-Mills, Benny Hinn and several others have now come to see the light and truth of the Catholic Church, you and I have every reason to be even prouder still of this faith. We wish to continue holding our heads high, living out the motto of unity, charity, fraternity and service.
Like the Marshallan founding fathers who were very worried about the possibility of Catholics leaving to join other non-Catholic societies, Marshallans of today must be ready to totally fall in love with the Catholic Church, and help others to embrace its practices, for after all, the church supplies enough opportunities which will inure to our success and health politically, medically, socially, financially and spiritually.
It is more than enough to be Catholic!
Being a Marshallan will make it even more so.
Today, Catholics face many threats, from within, when some of us Priest fail to live up to expectation, thus, breaking your hearts;
From within, when some of our lay faithful betray the faith by visiting other so-called powerful pastors in Ghana and Nigeria;
Again, from within, when members deliberately refuse to offer spiritual, social, moral and financial support to the church;
Still, from within, when Catholics join in baseless criticisms, or engage in apathy, while the church struggles on
On these occasions, the role of the Marshallan is to arise, like the founding fathers who arose, 92 years ago, and started this Noble order, to protect the Church and help make it grow and flourish, as it continues to nourish many more souls, on their journeys to heaven.
Thank you all very much, and may God richly bless you!