1966
When Society Coordinator, Sister Agnes Lanfermann, and the Society Leadership Team returned from Kulmasa, Northern Ghana, where the Centenary year was launched on 30th September 2024, they recalled how joyful the inauguration of the new family clinic had been.
Sister Agnes explained that many official guests were invited to join the Medical Mission Sisters for their celebration, including chiefs and elders of the local community, representatives of the district health authorities and diocese, and 250 local people from the surrounding villages. However, on the day itself, so great was the local excitement at having a new healthcare facility made available for people that over 1,000 men, women and children from the local communities made the long journey, including on foot, from their local villages to join in the celebration. Medical Mission Sisters are very much appreciated for their deep commitment and service to the people of Ghana over the past 75 years and especially, for setting up a new family clinic in a very remote, rural area of Northern Ghana where health facilities are not easily accessed by the poorest communities. You can hear a local chief from Kulmasa speaking about what the clinic means to people in his community in the video opposite.
It was a joyful, triple celebration that included everyone: launching the Society’s Centenary year; marking 75 years of MMS’ presence in Ghana; and inaugurating the long-awaited family clinic. Local women gave thanks by dancing in colourful procession and the chiefs and elders ordered a bull to be roasted so that everyone could feast together. No-one was left behind.
This reminds us a song composed by Sister Miriam Therese Winter about the Wedding Banquet.
The song tells the story of a man who holds a feast on his fine estate and invites all his neighbours, far and wide, to come and feast with him. However, when the time for the wedding banquet is come and the festive table is laid, no-one turns up, making excuses like: “I cannot come to the banquet, don’t trouble me now! I have married a wife, I have bought me a cow. I have fields and commitments that cost a pretty sum, pray hold me excused, I cannot come.” In anger, the master calls his servants and orders them to go and fetch the blind and lame, the peasant and the pauper, because his table must be filled. When the poor are all assembled, with still more room to spare, he commands his servants to go into the highways and byways to force people to come in - because his table must be filled before the banquet can begin.
The last words of the song remind us how, through this parable, God is teaching us a lesson:
If we’re slow in responding
He may leave us behind,
He is preparing a banquet for that
Great and glorious day.
When the Lord and Master call us
Be certain not to say
I cannot come …
In the 1966 recording opposite, you can listen to Sister Miriam Therese's song being sung by her and other Medical Mission Sisters.
Enjoy!