…Bemoans abduction of priests as Onitsha Archdiocese resumes 2025 activities
From Aloysius Attah, Onitsha
The Metropolitan Catholic Archbishop of Onitsha Archidiocese, Most Rev. Valerian Maduka Okeke has lamented the recklessness in the society of today describing such a situation as shameful and challenging.
Archbishop Okeke, who spoke during a homily at the Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity, Onitsha, today during a plenary mass for resumption of duties after the Christmas and New Year festivities by priests and staff of Onitsha Archdiocesan Secretariat also deplored the growing abduction of priests and religious and general cases of kidnapping and rising criminality in the society even as he expressed hope that the security situation will improve since according to him, nothing is impossible with God.
“The recklessness in our society is shameful and challenging. We cannot lead our people to God if we are reckless and disorderly in our actions” the Archbishop warned.
He urged the priests to regard the New Year as a year of repentance and prayers with which to take the faithful to God and also invoke God’s protection on them.
While congratulating some of the priests whose silver and golden jubilee anniversaries were coming up this year, he thanked God for the gift of priesthood and other innumerable and uncountable things God did for the priests and the faithful in general.
“May it be a year of divine guidance as we entrust our loving families, friends, and others to His hands, and may His grace be felt among us and those we serve,” the Archbishop prayed.
He reminded the priests of the church’s declaration of the year 2025 as the “Jubilee Year of Hope,” which they should be devoted to, adding that “if we have faith, we will see the glory of God.”