The Anglican Church’s Diocese of Harare has appealed to congregants to help one of its bishops who lost five family members in a space of few weeks.
In a letter dated February 4, the Bishop of the Harare Diocese, Right Reverend Dr Farai Mutamiri, notified church members that Bishop Jonathan Siyachitema lost his wife Rosemary, the executive director of the Consumer Council of Zimbabwe.
Mutamiri also revealed that Bishop Siyachitema’s daughters, Elizabeth and Rosemary, as well as brother, Reverend Fanuel Siyachitema, and sister, Mrs Judith Bindu, had all succumbed to COVID-19. He wrote:
As your bishop I am, therefore, appealing to you that, we create a platform at the diocesan level, to pull our little resources together (chema) which we can handover to the family as the diocese of Harare.
This is to try and mitigate the financial challenges that go with the handling of funerals.
May you extend this appeal to guilds and individuals in our churches.
Mutamiri also consoled the Siyachitema family, assuring that they were in the church’s prayers and encouraged them to draw strength from the Word of God. He said:
As a church, we pray for the Lord Almighty to give him the strength to hold on to his faith even in these dark hours of his life.
May God heal their broken hearts and bring that peace which passes all understanding throughout this sad and sorrowful phase in the family’s life.
May Bishop Jonathan also draw strength from the words of the Psalmist in Psalm 71.