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The Pope has appointed the Most Rev Paul Ssemogerere as the new Archbishop of Kampala Diocese.
Ssemogerere’s appointment was announced on Thursday at Rubaga Cathedral by the Pope’s ambassador to Uganda, Luigi Bianco.
The new Archbishop has been the Bishop of Kasana-Luwero Diocese and he has been acting as the Apostolic Administrator of Kampala Archdiocese following the death of Archbishop Dr. Cyprian Kizito Lwanga early this year.
The office of the Kampala Archbishop fell vacant on April 3, 2021, after the death of Archbishop Cyprian Kizito Lwanga. His lifeless body was found lying in his bed at his residence in Lubaga.
He had appeared in public at an ecumenical way of the cross the preceding evening. After the demise of Archbishop Lwanga, Pope Francis appointed Bishop Ssemwogerere as the Apostolic Administrator of Kampala Archdiocese, which he has been occupying for the last eight months.
Why Paul Ssemogerere?
Ssemogerere was appointed bishop of Kasana-Luweero on 4 June 2008. He had served as a long-time parish priest and vicar general of Kampala archdiocese. Ssemwogerere is also a widely connected prelate, especially in politics and business circles.
Kampala Archdiocese comes with the burden of being a political and business seat of Uganda. The ordinary of Kampala has to carry the weight of infusing the spiritual, moral as well as the political, social, historical, cultural etc of not only Buganda region but also, Uganda as a whole. It has not come as a surprise that Bishop Ssemogerere has been confirmed, the Archbishop.
Ssemogerere, of Lugave clan, was born at Kisubi, in Wakiso district, but very near Kampala city. He attended Kigero Primary School before transferring to Kisubi Boys Primary School. He then studied at St. Maria Goretti Senior Secondary School Katende, where he completed his O-Level studies. In 1976, Ssemogerere and seven other young men became pioneer students at St Mbaaga Seminary at Ggaba. This was the first class of this seminary, which specializes in admitting men to train as priests when they are older than usual, and without attending minor seminary. It was the late cardinal Emmanuel Nsubuga who spotted him and sent him to attain a Masters’s degree in Divinity at the Saint Francis de Sales Seminary, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in the United States. He was actually ordained deacon by Archbishop Rembert George Weakland, the Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Milwaukee. In 1983, Cardinal Emmanuel Nsubuga ordained him priest and served in different capacities until he was consecrated as bishop on 4 June 2008.
Paul Ssemogerere appointed new Archbishop of Kampala – Watchdog Uganda