New Presbytery House at St Martin de Porres, Polokwane, blessed and opened

Blessing of St Martin de Porres (Westenburg) newly constructed presbytery house

Bishop Jeremiah Masela of the Diocese of Polokwane blessed the St Martin de Porres (Westenburg) newly constructed presbytery house together with clergy, religious and the faithful of the diocese on the Feast of the Chair of Peter the Apostle on February 22.

St Martin de Porres was established in 1978 as an outstation of the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart and pronounced a parish in 2022. Bishop Masela stated that after proclaiming Regina Pacis and St Martin de Porres parishes he did not assign priests, and Father Reuben Galane would alternate on Sundays between the two newly established parishes. Father Galane was later assigned to Regina Pacis parish.

St Martin de Porres is the only multilingual parish in the diocese of Polokwane, the word of the Lord is proclaimed in three different languages on Sundays: Sepedi, Afrikaans and English to accommodate the linguistic, cultural and ethnic diversity of parishioners.

The presbytery house building project came about as a result of fundraisings, contributions from parishioners and monetary donations from outside. Both the Diocese and St. Martin de Porres parish contributed immensely to this project.

During his homily, Bishop Jeremiah Masela acclaimed that “What we witnessed today is a reflection that we as the Church are the rock as stated by Peter. Indeed the Church made it possible but at the centre of it all is Jesus Christ. I see Christ at the centre of it all, it is all flowing from Christ to all of us.

He continued, saying “We are grateful to God that this has been made possible by the inclusion and the involvement of all. We know that in the life of the Church, there is a fight or there is opposition from what is referred to in the Gospel as the underworld, the forces that are against the work of the Church but those forces from the underworld are not able to prevail. We are grateful to God for every individual who has been part of this community since its establishment; you know more than I do as the community. Even those who have gone to their eternal rest are so much part of us today, wherever they are they are indeed smiling and saying it has happened. Therefore, we can only express our gratitude to God that today we going to bless this house.”

The mission of building a presbytery house has been completed and the accomplishment of this project involved three levels of the Church, the parish community, the diocese and the upper level which is the Vatican. Bishop Masela stated that during his  “Ad Limina”  visit to Rome, he was told that his application for funding had been successful and signed for it whilst still there.

He concluded by saying “When we speak of the rock we are referring to the real rock who is Christ himself and the leadership at various levels of the Church starting with the Holy Father, down to a priest in the community and the community itself. Fr Maboea as a leader with a vision presented the project to the St Martin de Porres community and they came together for the actualisation of that vision. As a priest, Fr Maboea had the ability to hold it together and I am proud of the priests because I know they can hold it together.”