Guest Blog : A message from Kenya

By Fr Jim Fanning MHM

Dear Friends,

How was your year? It is customary at the end of the day in the Church to reflect on all the blessings we have received during the day and repent of any failings. Well we thank God that this year has been a year of relative peace in East Africa and that the road building programme has continued with good roads at last from Nairobi to Kampala. The long delayed under water fibre optic cable has arrived and we are now promised high speed internet access in line with the rest of the world.

These are three big blessings but the big disaster has been the weather. I have never known such an irregular and poor rainfall. Instead of our usual afternoon downpours we seem to have had just sprinklings of rain. Often the clouds have built up with black skies and then nothing comes of it. There was both water and electricity rationings in Nairobi and many people and livestock have died in Kenya because of drought and crop failure. There has been a dawning realisation that cutting down trees is partly responsible for the poor rainfall. Sections of the Mau forest which have been cut down will now have to be replanted.

My work has taken me much further afield this year with visits to my old mission in Basankusu in the Congo in June and to Anglophone Cameroon in November. Everywhere people seem ready to support their own missionaries from Africa. This year has seen our numbers of African Mill Hill Missionaries rise from 15 to 18, with the newly ordained being appointed to more distant fields in Pakistan and the Philippines. One of the first African missionaries Fr. Ephraim Odhiambo, who was ordained in 1996, has now arrived in England to do mission promotion there. For years we have heard predictions that peoples from Africa will bring the faith back to Europe.

I continue to ply the highways and byways of Kenya and Uganda in my red Suzuki Grand Vitara with  ‘Friends of Mill Hill’ written on the door. It enables me to pass without many questions and difficulties back and forwards through the borders of Kenya and Uganda as well as the police checkpoints.

I have had many nice visitors this year. Fr. Sebastian Park from Korea came to visit me at

Easter. We travelled together from Kampala to Nairobi visiting all the beautiful spots in Kampala, Jinja (source of the Nile), Tororo, Kisumu, Masai Mara and Nairobi . I also enjoyed the company of my niece Alicia who came out to visit her Dad, my brother Paul, around the same time. Her brother John Paul with his girlfriend Danielle also paid us a joint visit just after the departure of Fr. Sebastian. Following that my sister Mary came to visit once again in September. She is becoming a regular visitor and this time we managed to finish with a very nice stay in the southern beach at Mombasa. Visitors are always nice to have as they pull me out of my routine and give me a chance to see places which otherwise I would not visit. Having reflected on the year and thanked God for his blessings I am aware too of my shortcomings and wrong directions. Sometimes we err in the things we do and other times it is in the things we fail to do. I won’t bore you with the details of all this but just simply ask you for your prayers.

In 2010 I look forward to celebrating my 60^th birthday. I am beginning to feel that my time on the road should be coming to an end soon. I have been mobile now for ten years and whilst relatively still in good health I would dearly like to work in a parish for a few years before I get too old. I am eyeing my old diocese of Basankusu in the Congo (DRC) as my next appointment if I can convince my superiors in two years time. I feel more comfortable having a focus for the future. Please keep praying for me and helping me. I love doing this missionary work of witnessing to Our Lord Jesus Christ.

It is his birthday which is the occasion for writing  this letter and I wish you all a happy and holy Christmas celebration and once again a peaceful New Year,

With much love and prayers,

Father Jim Fanning MHM

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Fr Jim Fanning is a Missionary working in East Africa. He was born and raised in Mill Hill before joining the order and being ordained in 1973. His work is supported by many people in Mill Hill.

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