He said, “I take this opportunity to express my gratitude to Archbishop Isaac Amani, Archbishop Emeritus Mustafa Josaphat Louis Lebulu, all the Priests, the Deacons, all women and men Religious, the Lay faithful, and all people of good will.”
“Thank you very much for your love, your counsel, and the cooperation that you have given me throughout the entire period we have been together during my Pastoral ministry in the Catholic Archdiocese of Arusha,” the 61-year-old native of Tanzania’s Catholic Diocese of Moshi added.
He expressed confidence that the people of God in the newly erected Diocese would receive him warmly, saying he looks forward to working together with them as he did with the people of the Catholic Archdiocese of Arusha.
“You all know that our Church is one, holy, Catholic, and Apostolic, and that we are all a family of God,’ he said and added, “I have strong faith that the people of God in the Diocese of Bariadi will receive me and that we will work together as I did with you here in Arusha.”
Meanwhile, the Local Ordinary of the Arusha Metropolitan See, Archbishop Amani, urged the people of God under his pastoral care to continue journeying with the Bishop-elect as he prepares to begin his Episcopal ministry in the newly created Tanzania Diocese.
“We do not send him off with sadness but with celebration, knowing he is going to serve the wider Church. We believe God has deemed him suitable for this role, and we accompany him with our prayers and blessings,” he said in his remarks at the January 8 event, during which he presided over the Ordination of 11 candidates for the Diaconate.
He added, in reference to the Bishop-elect, “We thank God for the formation he received here and the great service he rendered. Let us congratulate him for accepting God’s call. From the day he was ordained a priest, he accepted to be sent wherever the Church needed him. Now he is going to learn, get to know new people, and continue to serve with the same humility.”
The newly established Bariadi Diocese becomes the eighth Suffragan Diocese of the Metropolitan See of Mwanza alongside Bukoba, Bunda, Geita, Kayanga, Musoma, Rulenge-Ngara, and Shinyanga.
According to the Vatican’s January 2026 statistics, the newly erected Tanzanian Diocese that measures 16,638 km² starts with 366,000 Catholics out of 1,221,540 people, representing 29.96 percent of the total population of the territory of the Episcopal See.
Nicholas Waigwa is a Kenyan multimedia journalist and broadcast technician with a professional background in creating engaging news stories and broadcasting content across multiple media platforms. He is passionate about the media apostolate and Catholic Church communication.