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November 30 to December 6, 2011
R5,50 (incl VAT RSA) Reg no. 1920/002058/06
Nativity church’s heritage plan meets opposition Page 4
A blueprint for the African Church Pages 6 & 9
no 4752
In faith, grab the starfish Page 7
Oblate: Murdered priest was ‘like my own brother’ By SyDney DuVAl
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N Eshowe priest who was found murdered might have known his killers, who stole personal items from him. Fr Senzo Mbokazi, 35, of St Pius X parish in Melmoth, KwaZulu-Natal, was found lying stabbed on his bedroom floor on November 20. He was bound hand and foot with his belt and the cord of a stereo player. Police described the scene as a terrible mess. The priest’s body was found after police and parishioners went to investigate why he had not appeared to say Sunday Mass. Bishop Teddy Kumalo of Eshowe said the diocese’s Catholic community was shocked and distressed at the news and the circumstances of the priest’s death. “People are expecting the priest to say Mass. They see his car is still there. Everything looked normal. Then, after waiting and waiting, they get the news that he has been found murdered.” Bishop Kumalo had finished doing confirmations at St Scholastica parish in Twasana when he was told of the murder. He immediately drove to the parish house at St Pius X where he himself saw the body of Fr Mbokazi lying on the floor. Captain Victor Mthombela of the Melmoth police, who with parish council chairman Dennis Wagner found Fr Mbokazi’s body, said the murder must have taken place on the night of Friday, November 18. Fr Mbokazi had been seen in the town about 19:00 that evening, when he reportedly also drew money from an ATM. Capt Mthombela confirmed that cellphones and wrist watches were missing, adding that Fr Mbokazi may have known the perpetrator/perpetrators. The case has been handed over to Organised Crime at Richards Bay. Newly ordained Oblate Father Bonga Majola of Johannesburg shared the shock and distress of the bishop, fellow clergy, religious and parishioners. “My family is devastated,” he said. “Fr Mbokazi was at my ordination at Alexandra a month ago and at my Thanksgiving Mass in my hometown Nkandla [in KwaZulu-Natal] a week later—and now he had been helping my family prepare for the Thanksgiving Mass and celebration at home in Nkandla for Saturday, November 26.” Fr Majola had known Fr Mbokazi when he was a pre-novice at Rayton and Fr Mbokazi was finishing his theological studies at St John Vianney, Pretoria. “He served in my home parish, Holy Trinity in Nkandla, as a deacon and later as an assistant parish priest,” Fr Majola said “That's when he became a very good family friend. He visited my family quite often at Nkandla and he really became part of the family. Even when he was transferred to Melmoth now and again he would come home to check on us. To my parents he was like one of their sons and to my brothers a true brother. “I was with my parents when we received the news of his death. They were inconsolable! We are all still shocked and really devastated by his death, and finding it hard to believe that he is gone.,” Fr Majola said. “I will remember Senzo as a person’s person, a free spirited man, friendly, sociable and indeed as my own blood brother. May he rest in peace.” Mr Wagner was at St Pius X church when
Fr Mbokazi failed to appear for Mass. “We were still waiting at about 8:30 for the 8am Mass. We were getting anxious. Father’s car was still there. Some parishioners decided to see what was happening at the parish house next door. They called and shouted, but got Fr Senzo Mbokazi, no response. who was found “We thought somemurdered. (Photo: thing was wrong and Sydney Duval) called Melmoth police. Captain Mthombela arrived and together we went to the parish house. The doors and windows were locked.” They gained access to the house through an old broken window. When they managed to open the locked bedroom door “we found everything turned upside down—a terrible sight”. At first they did not see any sign of Fr Mbokazi, but then found him lying upside down next to the bed. He had been tied up. “There was blood everywhere. We later found that clothing, watches and cellphones were missing,” Mr Wagner said. He described Fr Mbokazi as a good pastor who gave good sermons, was quiet spoken and always approachable. Fr Mbokazi was ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Gerald Ndlovu, retired of Umzimkulu, at St Patrick’s church, Empangeni, on December 3, 2005. The Requiem was held at Holy Cross church in Emoyeni on November 25, followed by the burial in the clergy cemetery. A Vigil Mass was held the night before. Fr Mbokazi is survived by an aunt at Kwambonambi, where he grew up.
Our lady of Guadalupe is depicted in a modern painting by Stephen B Whatley, an expressionist artist based in london. The appearance of Mary to St Juan Diego on a hill in the Tepeyac desert, near Mexico City on December 9, 1531 is said to have resulted in millions of conversions to Catholicism. According to the account of Juan Diego, the Blessed Virgin described herself by the Aztec nahuatl word-name of Coatlaxopeuh, pronounced “quatlachupe”, which became the Spanish “Guadalupe”. The feast of Our lady of Guadalupe is on December 12. (Photo courtesy of Stephen B Whatley)
‘Little doubt’ that Shakespeare was a Catholic By SARAh DelAney
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HERE is “little doubt” that William Shakespeare was a Catholic who was forced to hide his faith in Protestant England while leaving hints about his faith throughout his vast body of work, according to an opinion piece published in the Vatican newspaper. Taking a cue from renewed speculation about Shakespeare’s true identity sparked by the film Anonymous (which suggests that Shakespeare was a fraud and cover for the Earl of Oxford), L’Osservatore Romano wrote: “There may be questions regarding his identity, but not his religious faith.” The opinion piece said that this view was at least partly shared by the leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion, Archbishop Rowan Williams of Canterbury, who said in a debate at a literary festival last May that Shakespeare “probably had a Catholic background and had Catholic friends”. It also pointed out that shortly after the Bard of Avon’s recorded death in 1616, Anglican Archdeacon Richard Davies wrote, “He died a papist”, a pejora-
tive term Protestants used to refer to Catholics. The article said that while there is legitimate debate about who was truly behind the Shakespeare name, “there is little doubt about another question regarding the life of Shakespeare: his convinced adherence to the Catholic faith”. Shakespeare’s work, it said, “is full of open references to the Catholic religion”. These references are especially evident in the play Hamlet, it said. In the play, Hamlet speaks of purgatory—a belief which L’Osservatore noted is not shared with the Church of England and would have been evident in “Elizabeth's violently antiCatholic England”. The opinion piece also said the argument that Shakespeare lived a life “fleeing and denouncing the bloody persecution that Elizabethan England inflicted on its subjects that were following the beliefs of their fathers” was worthy of further serious study. Shakespeare scholars have also noted that his school teachers were Catholics and that he is said to have married his wife Anne Hathaway in a secret Catholic ceremony.—CNS
William Shakespeare is depicted at age 34 in this painting from 1847. An opinion piece in the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano said there is “little doubt” that the Bard was a secret Catholic. (Courtesy of Art Resource)