Société des Missions Africaines – Province d’Irlande
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né en 1898 à Paddington dans le dans le diocèse de Meath (Irlande) membre de la SMA le 30 juillet 1922 prêtre en 1926 préfet apostolique en juin 1934 décédé le 22 septembre 1962 |
1926-1953 missionnaire dans le vicariat décédé à Coniston, Angleterre, le 22 septembre 1962, |
Monseigneur William LUMLEY (1898 – 1962)
A Coniston (Angleterre), le 22 septembre 1962, retour à Dieu de Monseigneur William Lumley, ancien préfet apostolique de Jos (Nigeria), à l’âge de 64 ans.
William Lumley naquit à Paddington, dans le diocèse de Meath en Irlande, en 1898. A 22 ans, il entrait aux Missions Africaines. Il fit le serment en 1922 et fut ordonné prêtre en 1926. La même année, le père Lumley s’embarquait pour le vicariat de la Nigeria Occidentale.
Il fut le premier missionnaire à résider à Benin-City. Il devint procureur de la mission, puis inspecteur général des écoles du vicariat. En 1934, Mgr Lumley devenait le premier préfet apostolique de Jos, immense territoire de la Nigeria du Nord où l’Islam et la paganisme se partageaient presque également toute la population. Avec un zèle admirable, le jeune préfet apostolique se mit au travail et laissa à son successeur une florissante mission, élevée au rang de diocèse.
Les confrères qui le connurent en mission louent tous le zèle et la grandeur de Mgr Lumley. Il prenait part aux problèmes de chacun comme s’ils étaient ses propres problèmes. Il entraînait ses prêtres plus qu’il ne les poussait, et par la force de son propre exemple leur donnait une confiance qu’ils n’auraient jamais eue autrement.
Mgr Lumley usa sa vie au service de l’Afrique et au moment de l’élévation de la préfecture en diocèse, en 1953, il laissa sa place à un confrère plus jeune. Il accepta avec grand esprit de foi cette lourde croix, abandonner le champ missionnaire qu’il aimait et pour lequel il s’était dépensé sans compter, et accepta le champ plus paisible d’un ministère pastoral en Europe.
Il devint curé de la paroisse du Sacré-Cœur à Coniston, dans le diocèse de Lancaster en Angleterre. C’est là que le Seigneur vint reprendre son fidèle serviteur, ce « véritable apôtre ».
Bishop William LUMLEY (1898 – 1962)
William Lumley was born at Paddington, Clonee, Co Meath, in the diocese of Meath, on 5 March 1898. He died at Coniston, Lancaster, England, on 22 September 1962
William received his secondary education in the colleges of the Society. He studied in the Sacred Heart college, Ballinafad, Co Mayo (1916 17) and at St. Joseph’s college, Wilton, Cork, (1917 1920) before coming to the Society’s novitiate, at Kilcolgan, Co Galway. After completing his novitiate he was sent to study philosophy at Chanly, near Wellin, Belgium, where there were some 50 seminarians in training. This was a time when some students were sent to houses outside their own country to gain experience of internationally and to learn and teach languages. William was admitted to membership of the Society at Chanly, on 30 September 1922, and proceeded to the Society’s major seminary at Cours Gambetta, Lyon, France, for his theological formation, studying there for the year 1922 23. He completed his theological training in the seminary of the Irish Province at Blackrock Road, Cork. He was ordained a priest by Bishop Thomas Broderick, vicar apostolic of Western Nigeria, in St. Joseph’s church, adjoining the seminary, on 23 May 1926. He was one of a group of ten ordained on that day.
After ordination William was appointed to the vicariate of Western Nigeria, which was the first mission in Nigeria to be entrusted to the Irish Province, when Bishop Broderick was nominated in 1918. From the start William was to be marked out for posts of responsibility and leadership. After a period in Warri district, in 1927 he was appointed ‘procurator’ or treasurer for the vicariate, residing in Asaba. A year later, in 1928, and still retaining his procuratorship, he was the first missionary to reside in Benin city, which had been an outstation of Asaba since 1924. Benin city was to become headquarters of the vicariate in 1938 and seat of a flourishing diocese in 1950. In 1930 William took on the additional post of supervisor of schools. This was a post of vital importance, since the development of education had become a major priority at this time for a variety of reasons, not least the urgings of Archbishop Arthur Hinsley, the apostolic delegate, who had visited West Africa in 1928. In his capacity as supervisor William was responsible for the ever expanding network of schools, for the appointment of teachers, the maintenance of standards, the quality of the physical plant, the acquisition of new sites and, not least, for liaising with the government education department from which annual subventions were sought. In spite of these heavy responsibilities William found time to compile a catechism in Beni.
In June 1934 the vast prefecture of Northern Nigeria (comprising territory north of the Benue and Niger rivers and extending over the border into ‘French Niger’) was divided and two new jurisdictions formed, centred at Jos and Kaduna. William’s appointment as prefect apostolic of Jos came as no surprise. Here, over the next 18 years, in an area where Islam and traditional religions flourished, he was to lay the foundations for the thriving Church which now exists in that area a Church which is self perpetuating, staffed mainly by African priests, with many African religious and is currently led by an African archbishop, Gabriel G. Ganaka.
In the early years of his tenure, William’s small staff of less than a dozen Fathers was depleted by the tragic deaths of three young confreres within a short space of time (Florence O’Driscoll in 1935, and John Marren and Anthony O’Dwyer within days of each other in September 1937). During this period of trial and tribulation, he gave outstanding leadership, rallying his young team behind him. His policy towards the work of evangelisation was also to prove of critical importance. In the early years, before the creation of the prefecture, the missionaries who had worked in the Jos region had tended to concentrate on immigrant communities from the east, mainly Igbos, who lived in settlements along the railway line linking north and south.
When William assumed responsibility for the prefecture he vigorously began efforts to evangelise the indigenous population, establishing a tradition which was to be pursued by his successors and which in the long term was to root the Church firmly in the soil of Plateau State. In 1934 there were residential mission stations in Jos, Shendam, Udei and Kwande, catering for a catholic population of 2,000 members and 700 catechumens. There were 17 elementary schools, one teacher training college and in that year 34 catholic marriages were recorded (In a single station in Lagos, Holy Cross, in the same year 32 marriages were celebrated). In 1951, shortly before William’s mandate ceased, there were over 15,000 catholic members, 7,000 catechumens, 100 elementary schools, three teacher training colleges, and 170 catholic marriages. There were also five additional mission districts, namely Kafanchan [1936], Allogani [1939], Kagoro [1948], Kwa [1945] and Pankshin [1940]
On the erection of Jos diocese in 1953 William was passed over by the Roman Congregation which had charge of such matters. No doubt his age counted against him and it may have been felt that a younger, more energetic man, was needed. Moreover, it is possible that Propaganda was looking for someone with wider experience of the educational apostolate although, against this, it must be said that it was William who enlarged the vernacular training college in Shendam (founded in 1932, extended in 1935 and moved to Kwa in 1949) and founded the renowned college of Mary Immaculate (the teacher training college) at Kafanchan in 1949. He also gave priority to the founding of primary schools as a tool of the apostolate. More likely Rome may have wanted someone with the expertise to make the northern mission self supporting (Jos prefecture owed significant debts to the Irish Province and the Provincial administration was far from happy with this situation).
William’s successor, John Reddington, nominated in April 1954, had all these qualifications. Failure to submit regular statistics to Propaganda Fide, may also have played a part in the decision to overlook William. One well placed source expressed the view that it was ‘the state of his health at the end of his last extraordinary tour (1934 1952) which automatically ruled out his selection’; adding, ‘The fact that the twenty year old prefecture apostolic of Jos was raised directly to the status of vicariate, is a tribute to Monsignor Lumley’s development of the territory during his period of office’. William accepted the disappointment with a great spirit of faith, leaving the mission field he loved so well, and spending the remainder of his life ministering in England. There, from February 1955 until the time of his death, he served in a variety of parishes until he finally took up duty as parish priest of the Sacred Heart parish, in Coniston, in the diocese of Lancaster. His death was not unexpected as he had been in ill health for some time. The bishop of Lancaster celebrated his requiem Mass, in the presence of Archbishop William Porter, S.M.A, retired bishop of Cape Coast (Ghana).
William has the distinction of having spent the longest tour of duty of any member of the Irish Province. He served continuously in Jos from June 1934 until June 1952. The Irish Provincial, John A. Creaven explained in 1955 that the length of William’s tour was ‘due to his desire to set the new jurisdiction (to which he had been appointed) on a sound footing, a task which was made considerably more difficult owing to the disruption caused by the war in the matter of personnel, finance and supplies’.
He is buried in Lancaster, England.