In a video message, the spokesperson for the Southern Africa Catholic Bishops Conference, Father Smilo Mngadi, offered a wonderful summary of the significance of the beatification of Benedict Daswa, not just to the Church, but to the whole of South African society and the world:
“While at the Southern tip of South Africa, F.W. de Klerk was announcing the new liberation and the new dispensation of our country, on the northern tip of our country in Limpopo, in Thohoyandou, Benedict Daswa was giving his life to liberate us from the oppression, from the troubles of witchcraft in our country and in our world. So let us go and celebrate him but above all, take him as our model of Christian living and say ‘NO’ to witchcraft and all pagan practices and ‘YES’ to Jesus Christ.”
Pope Francis also praised Blessed Daswa’s witness during his Angelus address on Sunday. The Holy Father lauded Daswa’s “great consistency, courageously taking on Christian attitudes and refusing worldly and pagan habits.” His testimony, the Pope added, is united with “the testimony of so many of our brothers and sisters—young, old, children—persecuted, driven out, killed for confessing Jesus Christ.”
We all KNOW that we too are open and subject to many PAGAN practices wherever we are in the world – let us open our eyes and not think witchcraft is confined to only certain countries. Satanism, paganism, witchcraft are on the rise everywhere – just open a newspaper, go online, switch on your TV. Do YOU read your daily ‘horoscope’?
Bl Benedict Daswa Pray for us!
AnaStpaul 