Ugo Aliogo
As part its desire to support evangelism in Anambra State, the Anambra Anglican Fellowship (AAF) of Archbishop Vining Memorial Church, Cathedral GRA Ikeja, Lagos State has organised a launching ceremony to raise evangelical fund and also inaugurate the new patrons and patronesses for the fellowship.
Speaking at the ceremony organised by the AAF in Lagos yesterday, the President of AAF, Chris Obuekwe, said in promoting evangelism, the focus has not always in Anambra state, adding that AAF have been in Lagos for a long time contributing in very many ways in evangelism, church planting and other things.
He also stated that AAF belongs to the diocese of Lagos West and the fellowship started Archbishop Vining Memorial Church, Cathedral, “where we have members of this fellowship in many societies more than 36 societies in the church.”
Obuekwe explained that every citizen of the Church have been involved in building at least one or two churches in Lagos, adding that on the aggregate, members of the fellowship has helped to build more than 20 churches in diocese of Lagos West.
According to him, “We discovered that a lot of churches back home worship in very deplorable conditions. Many of them worship in thatch roofs, some of them worship in mud houses that have cracked, these houses have been patch over years, and some don’t have good roofs some we have decided to reach out to them in the course of our evangelism which is actually to spread the word of God, we intend to go there with human face.
“We intend to provide potable water to the parishes and communities where there is no water. There are places where the priests have no means of transportation as a result they have no means of going to their parishes because public transportation cannot get there because of the conditions of the roads. So we also intend to provide them with motorcycles, so that they would be able to get to their parishioners when there is rain. Some of these churches don’t have enough chairs, so we intend to provide them with chairs.
“Some have no light at all and by God’s grace, we hope to provide them with small generators that can help power their musical instruments. Some don’t have bibles and because they cannot afford them, we hope to give them Igbo bibles and hymn books.”
He further maintained that the fellowship also intends to train some priests in the seminary especially those who have no means, adding that there are eight dioceses in Anambra state, “and we don’t intend to go round all the dioceses or parishes”.
Obuekwe remarked: “We are going to do this as led by the Holy Spirit. When we did an on-the-spot assessment we saw that they really have the enthusiasm and they were worshiping from their heart. But we could see that the conditions under which they worshipped wasn’t kept comfortable and we intend to make it conducive.
“Now that we have taken off there are places we start from and it is not something that we hope to start today and finish next month, we are doing it as the spirit enables us.
“We identified these problems because we are worshipping under very beautiful conditions. We are planning to train possibly 10 priests through the direction of the Holy Spirit, not through people’s recommendations. We will concentrate on people who have the zeal to work for Christ, but don’t have the means and the same thing we will do for the churches. We will support churches which we know have no means of improving their worship conditions.”
