Despite the widespread terrorism which is increasingly affecting Burkina Faso, and although priests and catechists are the main targets among pastoral agents, the country has seen a growth in priestly vocations in recent years. Supporting these future priests in their formation is one of ACN’s priorities.
While for most people Christmas is a time of family reunions, this is not the case for many seminarians in Burkina Faso. Because of the serious security crisis caused by terrorism, some must forego joining their families.
“Not everyone knows where to go during the Christmas holidays,” Fr Guy Moukassa Sanon tells the international Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN). Fr Guy is rector of the St Peter and St Paul seminary of Kossoghin in Ouagadougou, the inter-diocesan philosophy seminary. For some of these young men, to go home would imply risking their lives, so instead they are welcomed in diocesan centres or host families or invited by other seminarians to spend the holidays with their families in safer regions.
Vocation in difficult times
Almost 40% of the young men at the inter-diocesan philosophy seminary come from dioceses in the “red zone” which are badly affected by terrorism. Despite all the difficulties, the number of seminarians in the country continues to grow. Just at St Peter and St Paul, the number of seminarians has increased from 254 in the 2019-2020 academic year – when terrorism began to affect the Church in Burkina Faso – to 281 for 2024-2025.
In the past some did risk joining their families. For Marius, a third-year philosophy student at the St Peter and St Paul seminary, it ended in tragedy. In 2022, while taking a route to visit his father in an isolated village under terrorist control, he was abducted. His body was never found, but the family is convinced that he was killed.
“Some seminarians have had narrow escapes,” recounts the rector. “One of them, for example, went home to spend the holiday with his family. While he was outside the house, the terrorists arrived. Their initial target was his father, a catechist, who fortunately was away at the time. However, the terrorists, who were well informed, then demanded the seminarian son. Hearing their threats, he climbed over a wall and fled into the fields under the cover of night. Although the terrorists went after him, they didn’t manage to find him. He hid for a whole day, waiting for the danger to pass before he returned home.”
According to Fr Sanon, the fact that so many young Burkinabés want to become priests despite the security crisis is thanks to good vocations work but also because it’s easy for young men to meet people in their daily lives “who witness to the love of Christ in an obvious way”. Since secularisation is not yet as present in Burkina Faso as it is in Europe, Fr Sanon explains that the awakening of a vocation is easier “than in a materialist context where you don’t expect anything of God”.
The challenges of forming future priests
The rector says that the number of seminarians at St Peter and St Paul is so great that there isn’t even enough space for them all. “We’ve converted community rooms into little units separated by partitions to accommodate them. However, the conditions are far from ideal for their studies, and even that hasn’t been enough to be able to welcome everyone, so we’ve had to accommodate 22 seminarians outside and send another 11 to a seminary in Mali.”
Fr Sanon underlines the importance of good formation of future priests for the credibility of the Church. “It’s crucial that future priests can give authentic witness to their faith, that they have really been able to meet Christ personally, that the Gospel is their food and their passion.”
Another major challenge in the formation of future priests lies in social concerns related to the co-existence of different religions, exacerbated by the security situation in Burkina Faso: “There are different terrorist groups in Burkina Faso. Some of them kill people without distinction, whether they are Muslim or Christian. Others, in contrast, who want to impose sharia, target Christians directly. Before terrorism, co-existence between Muslims and Christians was no problem, even in our families, which were often made up of several religions. Many seminarians have Muslim parents, and although that may initially have caused disappointment, at the end of the day it wasn’t a problem. However, today if you’re not careful, social cohesion can be threatened. That is why it is crucial to form future priests who promote communion, because the Church, at the service of society, must work for unity.”
Since Burkinabé dioceses are often unable to mobilise the necessary financial resources for quality seminary formation, ACN supports them in this important task. “I want to express my deep gratitude to ACN and all its generous benefactors who give sacrificially so that we can form Burkina Faso’s future priests,” says Fr Sanon. “Some of our seminarians are in a precarious situation; they don’t receive any help from their families, because these are in a sorry condition: displaced or prevented by the terrorists from bringing in the harvest. Thanks to ACN’s support we can finance their formation and that of their teachers.”
He adds: “Often, you can only appreciate things you have lost. Here, if you ask someone what he wants, he replies: peace. May the grace of the Infant Jesus reach all our hearts. I also pray for peace for all our benefactors: a peace which only the Infant Jesus can bring, a deep peace which the world cannot give.”
In 2024, ACN supported six dioceses in Burkina Faso with the formation of seminarians. The foundation also helped the formators at the Kossoghin inter-diocesan seminary of St Peter and St Paul (in the Archdiocese of Ouagadougou) and the preparatory seminary of Saint Irenaeus at Toésê (in the Archdiocese of Koupéla) through Mass stipends. ACN’s Christmas campaign this year is dedicated to persecuted Christians in Burkina Faso.
By Sina Hartert.
