Prof Michael Ogunu Elected international president of the World Apostolate of Fatima

by Admin · November 14, 2022

Professor Michael Ogunu

Professor Michael Ogunu, a frequent contributor to The Southern Cross, has been elected international president of the World Apostolate of Fatima.

The Nigerian has been the president and coordinator of the apostolate in Africa. He was elected its world leader during a general assembly at Fatima in Portugal, attended by 105 delegates.

The World Apostolate of Fatima was founded in 1947 by Mgr Harold Colganas as the Blue Army of Our Lady of Fatima. Since 2005 it is an International Public Association of the Faithful of Pontifical Right, with millions of members around the world who follow the requests made by the Blessed Virgin Mary to the three children of Fatima in 1917.

Its purpose is, as Pope Paul VI put it in 1967, “the glory of God and the reign of Christ through personal fulfilment and through diffusion of the message brought to the world by Our Lady of Fatima as the Catholic Church recognises and encourages it: an evangelical message of faith, of conversion, of prayer for unity and peace”.

The message calls for daily recitation of the rosary for world peace, prayers and sacrifices for sinners and reparation to the Eucharistic Jesus and to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, through the devotion of the Five First Saturdays of the month. The members of the World Apostolate of Fatima are invested with the Brown Scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and wear it always as sign of their personal consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

The worldwide movement is present in more than one hundred countries. Its international headquarters and secretariat are located in Fatima.

Prof Ogunu is also Nigeria’s national president of the Secular Order of Discalced Carmelites. He joined what was then the Blue Army of Our Lady of Fatima now known as the World Apostolate of Fatima in England in 1975 while studying for his master’s degree in Educational Administration.

On his return to Nigeria in 1976, he joined the World Apostolate of Fatima in Nigeria and was later elected national publicity secretary of the society, serving in that capacity for 12 years. He was elected national president of the society in 2003 and served in that position for nine years. In 2016, he was elected a member of the international board of trustees of the apostolate and later appointed president and coordinator of the World Apostolate of Fatima in Africa.

His election as the new International President of the World Apostolate of Fatima is a landmark in the history of the Apostolate.

“My immediate preoccupation is to promote throughout the world the entire message of Our Lady of Fatima, which includes daily recitation of the rosary, penance, sacrifice, consecration and reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary especially the First Saturdays Devotion of Reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, as requested by our Lord Jesus Christ and his Blessed Mother,” Prof Ogunu said.