By Isaac Ato MENSAH
Accra – 28 November, 2018.
His Grace Charles Gabriel Palmer-Buckle last Sunday declared the official celebrations of the 125th anniversary of the Accra Catholic Mission closed.
I arrived at 7:55am at the Independence Square, Accra; I had been warned – nay, I knew that if I did not arrive early, I could struggle to find a seat.
At the east end the usual rubbish pile was in full view.
‘No need to take pictures; I will always find this rubbish here,’ I always assured myself anytime I passed by with my phone’s batteries running low.
On Good Friday, after Dag Heward Mills’s Lighthouse Chapel International finished their crusade, the perimeter of the Independence Square was littered for one full week – seven days I say.
And it has been the trend for a while now. During the Eid-ul-Adha, it is far better. The only reason I guess is that our Muslim brothers only come to pray there and go cook at home; the prayers do not last for more than one hour.
My first shock was that the Catholic church was just like the rest; there were food vendors galore; the plastic bags were all over; vehicles, including a Ghana Armed Forces Bus, were all parked haphazardly.
I had charged my phone’s battery to 87 percent to take pictures.
In the stands I took photos of the completely worn out plastic chairs screwed into place with tetanus-dispensing bolts and nuts.
The lateness was my first shock; people were walking in late and with nonchalance.
But hear the bigger shock….
‘Those who have gone to take seats belonging to other groups, we are asking you to vacate…,’ a female and sometimes a male MC tried in vain to maintain order as people walked in and out of the inner perimeter with canopies and chairs arranged nicely.
To be fair, most of the rubbish had been there before 8am when I arrived, but nothing stopped the Catholic church with all its youth groups from cleaning up the place on Saturday; Catholic churches do that all the time.
A second bigger shocker – not the biggest – the MCs kept announcing: ‘All priests should form up under the Independence Arch to vest. Vesting is at exactly 8:30am’.
The repetitive nature of the announcement confirmed to me that all that was good and virtuous about order and gravitas in the church was under attack and being quickly eroded.
So like the prophet Nehemiah, I decided to leave my seat and go to the arch.
‘It was like a low intensity riot,’ as my mentor has always maintained about our public events.
Priests were taking selfies with congregants although it was past 8:40am.
I saw Hassan Ahmed, director of protocol at the Jubilee House (Office of the President of Ghana) – he was sweating like a pregnant fish, as we used to say in secondary school days; he just kept turning and making frantic telephone calls.
‘The president of the Republic of Ghana, His Excellency Nana Akufo-Addo arrives shortly,’ the MC kept announcing. ‘Priests please form up for procession.’
Then an ash pick-up truck arrived in reverse from the east end with some chairs for the presidential dais.
I started taking photos of the chief of protocol.
A security man promptly spotted me among all the smart phone selfie takers, dozens of cameramen and camerawomen, and the GTV live broadcast crew, ‘Officer, this man is taking pictures of the chairs’.
I was held physically under a false imprisonment.
‘Why were you taking pictures of the chairs?’ came repeatedly and several other questions followed in succession.
‘I’m taking photos of the chief of protocol.’
‘Did he give you permission to take photos of him? Who are you?’.
‘I’m a Catholic and a journalist,’ I said with chest out and chin up.
‘Delete the pictures,’ one demanded, letting go of me.
I honestly think they panicked at the headline of having beaten up a poor church boy.
‘Which media house?, came another man.
‘Freelance,’ I supplied.
‘Delete the pictures,’ charged another.
‘You take it and delete it yourself,’ I punched holes into their game.
‘No, you delete it, open the gallery,’ their argument grew weaker.
‘I’ve opened it, delete whatever you want and give my phone back to me,’ I ended the showdown.
The leader of the security team in a navy blue suit could only delete two photographs – those of the unpacked chairs.
Afterwards, he went to stand in front of the presidential dais mounted right in front of the arches and directed Catholic priests on how they should walk in procession as each pair approached him on their way to the sanctuary mounted in front of the statue of the unknown soldier to the north.
I was heart broken.
The priests just looked at him without saying anything in reply.
Of course by this time it was past 9am.
I departed to the north – to the health post behind the mounted sanctuary.
There a middle aged woman who was being carried in mid air by three men from the inner perimeter with their bare hands kept yelling, ‘Leave me alone, leave me alone’. They were all in anniversary cloth.
When the bishops and their acolytes had had their separate procession, it was then announced that we should sing an interlude to await the arrival of the president.
I felt like leaving, but I was not trained that way; there is nothing like that in THE ORDER OF THE MASS.
The president arrived at 9:30am; I turned the front cover and every page in the programme – procession was at 8:45am and Holy Mass at 9am!!!
Then yet another frantic announcement over the PA system as a delegation of bishops was summoned to walk about 100 meters from north to south to go and welcome our special guest and the first lady – Rebecca.
‘There are missionaries from all the seven continents working in the archdiocese of Accra which covers the whole of the Greater Accra Region and parts of the North and South Tongu districts of the Volta Region,’ Very Rev. Father Francis Adoboli, the chairman of the planning committee announced.
I immediately caught a beatific presence of the statistics and details he gave against the photos of rubbish I had taken.
‘We have disgraced ourselves,’ I surmised. ‘We are saying Holy Mass in filth.’
‘Errhhm, our cameramen, I am known for causing trouble,’ the first words of Archbishop Palmer-Buckle, our main celebrant, was loud and clear around the Independent Square. If it has to take the archbishop himself to repeat further that you should take your places….leave the space for the two officially assigned cameramen and go back to your assigned positions’.
OMG…did I feel relieved at some order at last….when I arrived the lady MC was even announcing that some Mass Servers had formed up for procession even though they were not on duty for the day!!!
After the usual brief introductory platitudes, ‘We begin this Holy Mass in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,’ intoned His Grace Palmer-Buckle; the congregation joined at the ‘Amen’.
I began to breathe some Catholic air. It was 9:43am.
I confirmed this on purpose. What is the point of attending church or any function on time in Ghana?
Worst of all when you comment about lateness, there is always some pushback in the form of infantile excuses.
The climax of the 125th anniversary of the Accra Catholic Mission was chosen to coincide with the Solemnity (Feast) of Christ The King, which ends the Catholic liturgical year, after which the season of Advent begins.
Archbishop Palmer-Buckle’s sermon was clear and concise; he gave a threefold reason why Jesus’s kingship is justified, the last being the need for us to celebrate the kingship of Christ ‘so that one day we may enter into its fullness’.
‘So eschatological,’ I shot back, in my head of course. ‘Your Grace, we are saying Holy Mass in filth right now.’
‘Jesus teaches us the type of kingship he requires of us. Jesus Christ is the faithful witness to the truth; the first born of the dead….and a witness to his God,’ the sermon went on.
‘His kingship is not one of wielding authority or lording it over others; his kingship is a kingship of service. He exemplifies it in service even to the point of death; in self sacrifice.
He teaches us the qualities of servant-kingship for the benefit of humanity.’
Great sermon by all standards.
If Palmer-Buckle could invite Nii Adama Latse II, Ga Mantse and Nii Okwei Kinka Dowuona VI, Osu Alata Mantse and president of Greater Accra Regional House of Chiefs, members of the diplomatic corps and Ghana government officials and deliver such a fearless message to them, then ought we all not to do our jobs faithfully and with diligence?
In the brochure on page 70, I noticed that as part of the year-long activities, the Mamprobi deanery, my original home base had gone to weed around the open gutters around the Mamprobi polyclinic.
The picture of rubbish was unmistakable. Uhmmm.
I noticed also that on the square, the cameramen and women came back after the Homily!!!
As for the president’s message, it is the same things you know already.
When he mentioned free SHS there were loud revolts from across the stands and from under the canopies in the perimeter; he surely heard it; it was embarrassing. A young lady standing where I stood shouted ‘TIN number’.
But when he donated 10,000 Cedis (USD2000) – OMG, the applause reverberated across the stands.
From America to Riyadh and even in Ghana, money trumps everything it seems. Lawd help us.
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