THE DEPUTY Ashanti Regional Minister, Mr. Osei Assibey Antwi, has taken a swipe at Christians, for allowing other members of the Ghanaian society, to question their teachings and upbringing, on every available platform. According to him, Christians had failed to make their light shine, in order to display the goodness of God, and indicated that in most cases, they do exactly what civil society would frown upon.

“In our workplaces, we (Christians) have not been able to lead exemplary courses worthy of emulation. It is my fervent hope that with churches getting deeply involved in the education of our youth, this trend will be reversed, and our Christian education will influence behaviours in the society,” the Minister stated at the inauguration of the Spiritan University College at Ejisu, in the Ashanti Region, last Friday.

The college was founded in 1990, as a house of formation, to train future Religious and Missionary Priests, for the congregation of the Holy Spirit in the Roman Catholic Church.

Initially, it offered a two-year programme, leading to the award of certificates, then to diploma awards, and now degree programmes, which have been accredited by the National Accreditation Board (NAB).

This follows the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MOU), to affiliate the institute to the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), in May this year.

Mr. Osei Assibey said it was, and is still, the prayer of the government that the transforming power of the Gospel, would make Christians more patriotic and responsive to their civic responsibilities, and challenged religious bodies to sensitize their members of their responsibilities to the country.

According to the Minister, it was disheartening to note that the number of Christian denominations increased by the day, but paradoxically, crime wave keeps rising, which to him should serve as a challenge to Christendom.

On his part, the Ejisu-Juaben Municipal Chief Executive, Mr. Ahenkora Afrifa, stated that formal education was one of the two pillars, in developing human capital to achieve socio-economic development.

He said the Irish Republic had demonstrated that the surest path to socio-economic transformation, in the 21st Century, was through the promotion of formal education at all levels, but more importantly, beyond secondary to the tertiary, and now the fourth level, which is research and development.

“Any society, which is anxious to develop needs, will promote critical thinking – a hallmark of tertiary education.”

The Rector of the Spiritan University College, Rev. Fr. George Boakye-Danquah (C.S.Sp.), said in an address that the Holy Spirit Congregation, in the Catholic Church, had always seen education as one of the key activities of its missionary endeavours – thus evangelization of the human person.

”We seemingly agree with an Aristotelian concept of education, where the difference between ‘being educated and uneducated,’ is like the difference between ‘being alive and being dead’, and where education is key to integral human development,” he pointed out.

The Rector explained that the General Council of the Holy Spirit Congregation, in Rome, recommended to all its members, going through formation, to study and keep themselves abreast with the academic challenges of the society today, having realized that today’s society needs spiritual leaders or priests, who are well-trained academically, spiritually, morally, psychologically and well-informed to meet the challenges of an ever-changing, fast and global society.

The occasion, which was graced by some eminent scholars, both within and outside the country, including Prof. William Ellis, KNUST Pro-Vice Chancellor, Prof. Awusabo-Asare, Archbishop Emeritus Akwasi Sarpong, Archbishop Thomas Mensah of the Kumasi Catholic Archdiocese, also witnessed the cutting of sod, for the construction of a new library and auditorium complex, for the new varsity.