Bagamoyo, Apostolic Vicariate of

BAGAMOYO, APOSTOLIC VICARIATE OF. - In East Africa; created in 1906 from the vicariate of Sudan, it is governed by the fathers of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit of the Dutch province. It is the mother mission of all the others in Tanganyika. Its area is 65,000 sq km and its population is 323,317 souls, of whom 98,000 are Arabs, on the coast, the rest of various Bantu races. The city of B. was an important slave market, and the activity of the missionaries began precisely in 1867, with a group of young slaves ransomed and educated for work in an agricultural colony, founded with the favor of the sultan of Zanzibar and admired by all. During the war of 1914-18 the vicariate was occupied by the Allied troops, who brought the war into German East Africa; the Cathedral was bombed, several stations destroyed, the German missionaries deported to India and placed under surveillance, which caused a halt in the work of evangelization and favored the penetration of Islam even into areas that until then had been resistant, such as among the Sandavi of Kurio.

After the war the apostolic vicar Msgr. Vogt was replaced by Msgr. Wilson, who organized the school according to the new British government program, obtaining its recognition and a subsidy, and opened in Morogoro a central normal school for the training of catechists of the various vicariates of Tanganyika. Islam always remains the great obstacle: nevertheless the mission progresses. Today it has 76,561 Catholics and 6,791 catechumens. The priests are 62, the Brothers 22, the sisters 66, the catechists employed in the mission are 510 and the teachers 148. The primary schools (64) instruct 8,152 boys and girls, the vocational schools (3) 63 young men and the three normal schools prepare 100 female teachers and 210 male teachers.

Giovanni B. Tragella