Catholic Bishops in Southern Africa Highlight “pastoral priorities”

In their one-page statement shared with ACI Africa on Monday, August 11 following their Plenary Assembly held at Khanya House in the Catholic Archdiocese of Pretoria, the SACBC Communications Office has outlined the various themes that guided the meeting of Catholic Bishops in Botswana, Eswatini, and South Africa, key among them the need to renew and strengthen Church institutions in the region.

The Catholic Church leaders “gathered to reflect on the Church’s pastoral priorities and social challenges in light of the ongoing synodal journey,” reads in part the statement dated August 8. The statement further reads, “Key discussions included the renewal of Catholic higher education, strengthening diocesan synodal structures, lay formation, and financial sustainability within Church institutions.”

At the official opening of the SACBC Plenary Assembly on August 5, the concern that faith in some of the three member countries is on the decline came up. In South Africa for instance, Bishop Sithembele Anton Sipuka of the Catholic Diocese of Mthatha  likened the country’s current situation to “a boat caught in a storm”, noting that faith practice in the country had plunged.

In his August 5 homily at the opening of the SACBC Plenary Assembly, Bishop Sipuka reflected on the instance in the Bible, where the disciples are caught in a storm, and appealed to the people of God in South Africa to remain firm in faith. In towns of the Eastern Cape, the Local Ordinary of Mthatha Diocese, who doubles as the president of the South African Council of Churches (SACC) said that “Sunday is like Monday, and there are fewer people in Church.”

He further lamented, “Without consultation, the department of education holds classes on Saturday and Sunday, preventing the children who still care about the faith from attending Mass on Sunday and Catechism on Saturday”. “What can the Churches do when the government keeps the children away from them?” he lamented, and added, “Schools do not even have morning prayer assemblies anymore, to say nothing about religious education.”

Other issues that came up in the Plenary Assembly, whi the SACBC Communications Office has highlighted in the statement include a memorial lecture and portrait unveiling in honour of Bishop Pius Bonaventura Dlamini, South Africa’s first black Catholic Bishop.

The SACBC members further engaged on the legacy of Bishop Fritz Lobinger, Bishop emeritus of the Catholic Diocese of Aliwal, who they said promoted lay leadership and community-based Church life. Bishop Lobinger, from Germany, passed on August 3 aged 96. The five-day Plenary Assembly that concluded on August 8 further approved the annual observance of the Feast of Creation, aligning with the African Church's call for ecological conversion.

The Catholic Church leaders also discussed the Golden Jubilee of the Inter-Regional Meeting of the Bishops of Southern Africa (IMBISA), scheduled to take place in Eswatini’s only Catholic Diocese of Manzini from September 24 -29. SACBC members further settled on January 2026 as the date for their next Plenary Assembly.

ACI Africa