DRC Missionary Leads the Youth

To an Oblate priest in KwaZulu-Natal it is the spirit of his community that keeps him going. Opening a series of profiles in the Year of Consecrated Life, Stuart Graham visited St Theresas mission in Inchanga.

Father Jean-Lambert Nzaji Kalala OMI cuts a popular figure among the youth in the area served by St Theresas mission in the village of Inchanga, halfway between Durban and Pietermaritzburg.

It is a difficult time to be young, particularly if you are poor, says Fr Kalala who serves St Theresas with his fellow Oblate of Mary Immaculate Fr Mthokozisi Mncwabe.

The youth need guidance and wisdom more than ever, Fr Kalala says.

Young people are so easily alienated. When you approach them, it is so important to listen not with a mindset, but to walk with them and to understand where they are, he advises. When you do that they find it easier to relate to you.

The young people Fr Kalala works with have many problems, ranging from drugs to teenage pregnancies. Mostly though, they simply do not know how to cope with the struggles of daily life, he says.

The community is semi-rural. There is no development happening here. People depend on grants. Many are not at school and loiter around the area. The level of young pregnancy is enormous, he explains.

Many of the youngsters lack education and come from broken families. They do not have great support. [To many people] having a child is a way to have money. Some follow other kids, thinking: my friend does it, so I will do it.

Fr Kalala, who is the chaplain for youth in the Highway deanery of the archdiocese of Durban, says that when Pope Francis announced 2015 as the Year of Consecrated Life he found himself reflecting on his own youth and on the calling he received early in his life.

I was a young man, living in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) when I received my calling, he says.

Now, after 15 years as a priest and 28 years in religious life I find myself trying to capture the days of my youth. How did I get myself in this vocation? Was I touched? Was I motivated by missionaries who gave me the idea to join this religion? he reflects

Fr Kalala completed his formation in the DRC, coverering such fields as philosophy, missionary experience and theology.

After my [ordination to the] priesthood I asked for work ad intra or ad extra. I was open to be sent to whatever country. They sent me to South Africa, so I came here in 2001.

Fr Kalala believes that the Year of Consecrated Life has raised a challenge for religious around the world.

It is a challenge to us. We have to ask: Do we still have our identity? Do we still love this life? What does this year mean to us?

For me the year is a way to look back and shake my motivation as a missionary and to see how can I improve and [get] other people to understand this life, he says.

Fr Kalala says he wants to use the year to show young people what it is like to live a consecrated life.

He is introducing the youth to the spirituality of St John Boscothe Italian saint and founder of the Salesian order who worked with young people in Turin in the 19th centuryand is challenging them to understand the importance of religion, education and social skills in their lives.

A typical weekday at St Theresa’s starts for Fr Kalala with morning prayers, and on Tuesday and Thursday Mass is held. He and Fr Mncwabe visit hospitals and respond to the needs of the people in the area.

Fr Kalala says it is the vibrance of Inchanga that keeps him going.

The spirit of Fr Albert Hanon, an Oblate who founded the first Catholic mission at Inchanga in 1924, is alive and well at St Theresas, Fr Kalala says.

Fr Hanon worked tirelessly, farming, evangelising and caring for the people in the area. In 1928 he had collected enough money to build a church.

In the same year an Oblate novitiate for African brothers was started and the first African Oblate brother, Leo Gumede, joined the staff.

The intermediate school for African children was built in 1930; it is now part of the Inchanga Primary School.

Inchanga also has the KwaThintwa School for the Deaf, founded by Archbishop Denis Hurley, the Ethembeni School for the physically challenged and a pre-school creche, Mater Spei. All are situated close to the church.

The Dominican Sisters run the Mater Consolans Aids hospice and also care for and counsel young women in trauma and pregnancy crisis in the Mater Africae home, which forms part of the Right to Live Project.

Fr Kalala and Fr Mncwabe serve five outstations: St Augustines in Emboyi, St Eugene De Mazenod in Sthumba, All Saints in Skhelekhehleni, Holy Rosary in Msunduzi, and Sacred Heart in Camperdown.

Fr Kalala says he is motivated by Inchanga’s record of having produced more priests than any other mission or parish in the archdiocese of Durban.

To date, ten priests and three religious sisters received their calling while at Inchanga. It is a trend that he and Fr Mncwabe want to continue.

Three young men from the parish are currently in the initial stages of formation, says Fr Kalala.

I am grateful that we [Oblates] have two, and one who joined the archdiocese in Durban as a candidate for the secular priesthood (priests who dont belong to a religious order or congregation).

We also have a girl who would like to be a nun, he added.

Fr Kalala believes the Year of Consecrated Life is a wonderful chance to attract more to a religious life.

From my side I will try to renew my religious life, he says. But I will also try to show it to others and get them to see what a wonderful life it is.