A Brief History of the SACBC

by Gunther Simmermacher · November 15, 2022

The SACBC bishops, staff and advisers on the occasion of the silver jubilee of the Hierarchy on February 8, 1976. Front row (from left): Bishop G van Velsen (Kroonstad), Archbishops G Daniel (Pretoria), John Garner (Emeritus of Pretoria), A Poledrini (Apostolic Delegate), Cardinal Owen McCann (Cape Town), Archbishops JP Fitzgerald OMI (Bloemfontein), Hurley OMI (Durban), Bishops H Boyle (Johannesburg), E Schmid CMM (Mariannhill), P Butelezi (Umtata).
Second row from front: Fr N Coughlan (Durban, Secretary), Fr H Carstens OP (Kroonstad, Vicar Capitular), Bishops S Naidoo (Auxiliary of Cape Town), J Murphy (Port Elizabeth), U Murphy CPC (Botswana), B Dlamini (Auxiliary of Mariannhill), J Durkin MSC (Louis Trichardt), A Reiterer MSFS (Witbank), J Rosner SAC (Queenstown), M O’Shea (Ingwavuma), Fr A Wilden (Bethlehem, Vicar Capitular). (File photo, colourised for The Southern Cross)

Little fuss was made when the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference (SACBC) first met in March 1947 in Mariannhill. There was no grand announcement nor a big celebration — other than that associated with the episcopal ordination of Bishop Denis Hurley for what was then the vicariate of Natal.

Southern African bishops had been gathering before, usually for purposes of funerals, jubilees and ordinations, such as that of Bishop Hurley, which brought them together 75 years ago. On one such occasion in 1919, the assembled bishops had given the go-ahead for the founding of The Southern Cross as the national weekly newspaper (it became a magazine the month of its centenary in October 2020). But these were ad hoc meetings.

In the 1940s, the apostolic delegate, Archbishop Martin Lucas SVD, urged the bishops of Southern Africa to constitute themselves as a bishops’ conference. With travel having become easier than before, this would enable the local Church leaders to meet on a regular basis, to cooperate more closely, and to speak with one voice, if necessary — and the rise of apartheid soon after made the latter frequently necessary.

The first pastoral letter by the bishops’ conference was issued after that initial plenary in March 1947. It called on the faithful to build up the Church in South Africa, for example by modelling their home on the Holy Family, and by sending their children to Catholic schools.

Hierarchy established

The SACBC elected its first president with the establishment of the local hierarchy in 1951 (see our January 2021 issue). That moment saw the restructuring of the old vicariates into dioceses, with four metropolitan sees (or archdioceses): Bloemfontein, Cape Town, Durban and Pretoria. The first SACBC president was Archbishop Hurley, who served in that position until 1961, and again from 1981-87.

He was succeeded by Archbishop (later Cardinal) Owen McCann (1961-74), Archbishop Joseph Fitzgerald (1974-81), Bishop Reginald Orsmond (1987-88), Bishop (later Cardinal) Wilfrid Napier (1988-94, 2003-06), Bishop Louis Ndlovu (1994-2003), Archbishop Buti Tlhagale (2007-13), Archbishop Stephen Brislin (2013-19), and since 2019 Bishop Sithembele Sipuka.

The SACBC was slow in opposing apartheid, though quicker than most other Churches. Conscious of the regime’s innate hostility towards the Catholic Church, the bishops often took a conciliatory position towards the government. This was driven largely by a concern for maintaining the Church’s network of schools and hospitals. Though a first carefully-worded statement against apartheid was issued in 1952, that attitude changed in 1953 when the regime sought to enforce its Bantu Education on Catholic schools. The SACBC spearheaded a huge fundraising campaign to ensure the independence of its schools.

Catholic schools would remain a thorn in apartheid’s side. When in the mid-1970s the Dominican Sisters unilaterally decided to open their schools to all races, with other congregations quickly following suit, the SACBC was caught flat-footed. After an initially cautious response, they soon fully supported the move. Schools apartheid was smashed, at least in private institutions.

Top: Cover of The Southern Cross January 24 1951. (Bottom)The bishops and prefects apostolic of South Africa with leading priests in 1947. (Front from left), Bishops Hurley, Colbert, Chichester, O’Leary, Fleischer, apostolic delegate Archbishop Lucas, Bishops Hennemann, Gothard, Meysing, Thünemann and Mgr Riegler. (Back) Frs Feurer CMM, Baur SMB, Dom Lambert OSB, Frs Hartjies OMI, Catocci OSM, Winterle CSSp, Mgr Lück SCJ, Mgr Schaff OSB, Mgr Rosenthal SAC, Fr van t’Westeinde OSFS, Mgr Boyle, Mgr Lucas OFM, Fr Hebert OMI, Mgr Koenig SAC, and Fr Hyis OSFS. The monsignori were prefects apostolic without an episcopal title at the time.

Apartheid ‘intrinsically evil’

In 1957, the SACBC issued its first condemnation of apartheid. Led by Archbishop Hurley, it denounced apartheid as “intrinsically evil”. But the conference was not united in its stance against apartheid. In the mid-1960s, the polarisation within came to a head when Archbishop William Whelan of Bloemfontein, a man who preferred accommodation with apartheid, clashed publicly with his fellow Oblate, Archbishop Hurley. The apostolic delegates of those times also favoured a more diplomatic approach. According to one scholar, the Catholic Church in South Africa was at once victim, accomplice and perpetrator.

By the late 1970s, the bishops had positioned themselves more unequivocally against apartheid, no doubt influenced by the uprisings of 1976 and the ongoing detentions, torture and bannings of priests, such as that of Fr Smangaliso Mkhatshwa — who was appointed secretary-general of the SACBC in 1981, even though he was still under banning orders.

In the 1980s, this opposition became increasingly outspoken, and the regime’s response more severe. In 1986 the SACBC founded the weekly newspaper New Nation as a means of propagating news about apartheid oppression and the people’s response to it. The weekly, which published until 1997, became the first alternative newspaper to be banned, for three months, in 1988.

The same year, in October 1988, the SACBC headquarters in Pretoria, Khanya House, was bombed. In 2000, amnesty for the bombing was granted by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to 19 former security police members, including the notorious Eugene de Kock.

In 1983, a group of Catholic bishops, led by Archbishop Hurley, was the first official delegation of South Africans to formally meet with the African National Congress in exile, in a London hotel.

Post-apartheid challenges

The dawn of democracy in 1994 changed the bishops’ focus to other social and moral issues. The SACBC strongly opposed the legalisation of abortion in 1997, and in the 2000s turned its focus on the HIV/Aids pandemic. While the bishops were divided on the use of condoms as a means of preventing transmission of the virus, they found common ground in setting up the SACBC Aids Office, which under the guidance of Sr Alison Munro OP and Johan Viljoen was the first body in South Africa to systematically set up retroviral treatment clinics, at a time when the Mbeki government declined to do so. The Aids Office continues to do outstanding work today.

Through the Denis Hurley Peace Institute, the Southern African Church was also engaged in peacemaking activities in other parts of Africa, including the mediation leading to South Sudan’s independence in 2011. Throughout the SACBC, different departments and associate bodies are making a difference in fields as diverse as social justice, social and economic development (especially in rural areas), education, health, human trafficking, ecumenism, evangelisation and formation, and so on.

These activities are guided by the current pastoral plan, “Evangelising Community, Serving God, Humanity and All Creation”, which was launched in January 2020 to succeed the 1989 pastoral plan, “Community Serving Humanity”.

Within the global Church, the SACBC was blazing a trail by elevating women to leadership positions. In the early 1980s, Sr Brigid Flanagan HF served as associate secretary-general, at a time when Fr Mkhatshwa was limited in his activities by his banning orders. In 2005, Sr Hermenegild Makoro CPS was first appointed associate secretary-general, and from 2012-20 secretary-general. Currently Sr Phuthunywa Siyali HC is the associate secretary-general, working with Fr Hugh O’Connor.

While in 1947, all bishops were white and many of them missionaries, 75 years later, 18 of the currently-serving 28 bishops are of colour, and 22 are locally-born.

The history of the SACBC was published along with the first part of an interview with SACBC president in the August 2022 issue of the Southern Cross magazine