Burkina Faso: Bishop mourns death of missing priest

by CNS · January 23, 2021

The body of a priest was discovered in a remote forest in Burkina Faso four days after he was declared missing. “It is with deep sorrow that I bring to everyone’s knowledge that the lifeless body of Father Rodrigue Sanon,” Bishop Lucas Kalfa Sanou of Banfora announced Jan. 22.

Bishop Sanou called on the faithful of the diocese “to pray intensely for his soul and remain confident in the merciful love of the Lord.” Father Sanon, a priest in the southwestern town of Soubakaniedougou, disappeared Jan. 19 as he drove from his parish to Banfora to attend a meeting of priests with Bishop Sanou.

His vehicle was found Jan. 21 in the Toumousseni forest, located 17km from Banfora; his body was discovered soon afterward, according to Fides, the news agency of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples.