ARCHBISHOP NKETSIAH DEDICATES A MORGUE

A ceremony has been held at the premises of St. Gregory Catholic Hospital at Buduburam in the Central Region to dedicate a mortuary which had been built by the Archdiocese of Cape Coast. The facility which was put with a loan facility from the Investment Office of the Archdiocese is meant to cater for the dead in around the community according to the Investment Director, Very Rev. Fr. James Essuon.

In his welcome address, the Archdiocesan Health Director, Mr. Ansah, said the Catholic Church upholds human dignity both in life and in death and, therefore, the Church would always strive to protect same.  Death, according to him creates an opportunity for humankind to meet his or her Creator and therefore, should always accord the dead  with dignity in the spirit of Communion of the Saints.  Mr. Ansah further told the workers at the morgue and also by extension all the health workers in the facility to handle patients who visited the health facility with care and love. They were told to handle the dead in the morgue in a way that they would like their own lifeless bodies to be handled when they die.  Very Rev. Fr. James Essuon on his part, said that for Catholics, fullness of life is realized from the womb to the grave and so it was in pursuit of finding a more dignifying place to keep people who pass on into eternity that brought the idea of the construction of the morgue into being. Fr. Essuon, who supervised the construction of the facility commended the contractor, Mr. Kakraba of UCC for a good job done. He also thanked some experts from the Central Regional Hospital Mortuary who brought their expertise to bear to see the successful completion of the facility. The District Chief Executive of Awutu-Senya commended the Catholic Church for citing the facility in the District since there was none in the neighbourhood .  Mr. Sackey of the National Catholic Secretariat also commended the Archdiocese for bringing into being what had been thought of long ago. He cautioned the workers to keep the facility well in order to attract high patronage.

Archbishop Matthias Kobena Nketsiah in his address bemoaned the lack of care for the sick in certain homes. He said that as a priest, when sometimes he went on home visitation during pastoral visists, he met situations where some aged and sick members of the family had been abandoned. He urged the people gathered there and the society at large not to pay too much attention to funerals but accord the aged in our society with dignity. He said that as Christians, we believe in life after death and so we must give respect to our mortal remains. The human body, according to Scripture, is God’s temple and, therefore, whether in life or in death,  we should keep the body well, he intimated.

In his closing remarks, the Paramount chief of the Traditional Area, Nana Abor, was full of praise for the Catholic Church for what it was doing in the area. He made mention of the St. Gregory Hospital, the mortuary and the Senior High School at Buduburam. He appealed to the Archbishop to help establish a Nursing Training college in the District.

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