Madrid – Meetings with the families of the Comboni Missionaries and with the “Friends of the Mission”

As tradition dictates, this year, too, the community of the Provincial Headquarters in Madrid organised two eagerly awaited annual gatherings: on 17^th May, with around 40 relatives of confrères from central Spain, welcomed in the “Faré Hall”; and on 29^th May, with more than 60 “Friends of the Mission”, in the larger Exhibition Hall of the magazine Mundo Negro.

Both meetings were animated by the Madrid-born Comboni missionary Fr Rafael Armada, who has recently returned from South Africa after spending 20 years there as a missionary. Speaking to both groups, Father Rafeal gave a compelling account of his experience in the African country.

At the beginning of both events, Fr Rafael showed a video clip featuring the song Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika (“God Bless Africa”), the South African national anthem of the post-apartheid era. He explained: “This anthem is truly a prayer, and it is always used to open any important event in Nelson Mandela’s country.”

Fr Rafael recalled some of the most significant experiences that marked his years in South Africa, especially in Acornhoek and Waterval, where he arrived in 2001 shortly after his priestly ordination. “They were years of intense pastoral activity in a context marked by the spread of HIV/AIDS. I immediately became involved in accompanying support groups in clinics, especially women’s groups, visiting infected people, and organising awareness workshops on HIV-positive status,” he recalled.

Having returned to Spain in 2010, he remained there for six years, mainly engaged in journalism studies, before returning to South Africa, where he was assigned to the diocesan pastoral centre in Lydenburg, working in a team with other pastoral workers and leaders of various associations in the Diocese of Witbank.

Another important aspect of his missionary experience was missionary animation in Silverton, through the promotion of the Comboni magazine Worldwide, of which he served as director for more than five years. He recalled: “At weekends, I went out with two lay people for missionary animation activities in the Pretoria and Johannesburg area.”

Since 1^st May 2026, Fr Rafa Armada has been a member of the Province of Spain. Born in Madrid into a large family of ten children — five boys and five girls — he entered the Comboni postulancy in Granada in 1992. He completed his novitiate in Santarém, Portugal, and after professing his first vows in 1996, he was assigned to the international scholasticate in Nairobi, Kenya.

Fr Gbama Nsusu Boniface, mccj
Photos: Justus Oseko