At a time of significant demographic shifts in Ghana’s religious landscape, the Bishop of Sunyani Diocese and President of the Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference, Matthew Kwasi Gyamfi, has stressed the need for a renewed missionary spirit in the Catholic Church — beginning from the formation of future priests in the seminary.
Gabriel Asempa Antwi – Accra.
Preaching at the 2025 Benefactors Day celebration at St. Paul’s Catholic Seminary in Accra, Bishop Gyamfi identified a concerning decline in the Catholic population in Ghana and called on seminarians, formators, and benefactors to spearhead a new evangelizing momentum rooted in pastoral zeal and spiritual renewal.
Declining number of Catholics
“We need to breed a new group of priests who will make things new,” he declared, stressing that the Catholic Church in Ghana requires a transformation that begins with those preparing for the priesthood.
“To make the Church new, my dear seminarians, [do so] with a passionate evangelization, so that you reverse the negative growth rate in numbers of the Church.”
Referencing recent census data, the Bishop of Sunyani outlined the troubling trend: “In the year 2000 census, Catholics were 16.4% of the Ghanaian population. In the year 2010, we had become 13.3%. In the recent census 2020, it was 10.1%.” He described the decline as an “existential” threat to the Church’s mission, adding, “We should not be complacent and think everything is okay. Everything is not okay.”
Bishop Matthew Kwasi Gyamfic- Mass for benefactors
Rekindling the Church’s evangelical mission
Bishop Gyamfi’s homily was inspired by a question from a seminarian who asked what the main challenge of the Catholic Church in Ghana was today. For the prelate, the answer lies in rekindling the Church’s evangelical mission. “As far as converts are decreasing and you’re not making more and more converts as the Apostles did… we can no longer feel comfortable,” the prelate said.
Drawing on the day’s readings, the Bishop urged the seminary community to look to the early Church for inspiration. “Take a look at how the Apostles did it… Within a space of a few years, Paul and Barnabas… made a considerable number of disciples. Increase in conversions, not decrease.”
Addressing the nature of priestly ministry, Bishop Gyamfi emphasized that ordination must be matched with active missionary service. “The priesthood is not just a title or a commodity. It is an activity. The more you practice as a priest, the more you deserve the name,” he concluded.
