A multdiocesan bishop

BISHOP James Holmes-Siedle, a native of Streatham, London, hurried back recently to Kenya after a short leave in London to keep the golden jubilee of his priestly ordination on African soil where he has served for the past 50 years. An old-boy of St Joseph's College Beulah Hill, he joined the White Fathers in 1927 and was ordained in 1935. He was posted to the then Vicariate of Tanganyika, which occupied the whole of the western half of today's Tanzania. He had set his heart on it from his student days.
He served in mission stations and it the African Teacher Training College at Ujiji. In 1946 when the Vicariate was divided in two, he became Bishop of the southern half, designated Vicariate of Karema. He came home to be consecrated bishop in the chapel of his old school by the late Archbishop Amigo. By 1958 he was able to hand it over to an African as its new Bishop. It had meantime become a fully fledged diocese.
He was then appointed by Rome as Bishop of' the territory north of Karema, the Diocese of Kigotna. Here again Africanisation of the Church was very much to the fore in his apostolate and in 1970 he was again able to select an African
SUCCeSSQT.
Having done so he first undertook retreat work in various places in East Africa. For the past seven years he has been resident at the Sotik Pastoral Centre in Kenya and conducting courses for layleaders who are increasingly key figures in the village areas of the enormous mission-parishes.
His courses have been in such demand that in the space of the first two years alone they were attended by 350 participants.
Explaining why he only took nine days leave in London he said: "My companion at the Centre in Kenya was all alone and there was a lot of work waiting to be done . .. and then there was also my jubilee".
My thanks to Fr William Burridge WF for the above news.