Kim Groop With the Gospel to Maasailand - Åbo Akademi

Kilimanjaro was well underway and the enlargement of the Lutheran
work was timely. Moreover, with increased competition from the
Catholic Holy Ghost Fathers 59 , swift expansion was considered
necessary. In October 1896, after receiving orders from the board in
Leipzig, Ovir and Segebrock travelled to Mount Meru to make
preparations for the foundation of a station amid the Meru [Waro] tribe
inhabiting the southeastern slopes of the mountain. In an optimistic letter
to Missionary Emil Müller, Ovir reported about a friendly reception by
Mangi Matunda, the Meru Chief. Ovir also noted that the Holy Ghost
Fathers had not preceded them. 60
The young missionaries eagerly set to work reconnoitring the area
in search for a suitable location for a mission, which they found at Akeri
close to the River Malala. Though fully aware of Meru and Arusha
opposition against European influence, Ovir and Segebrock confidently
turned down repeated offers to stay with Captain Kurt Johannes and
Lieutenant Moritz Merker in a nearby military camp. Yet, on the 19th of
October, when the purchase sum – a large piece of cotton – was paid for
the Akeri plot, the missionaries were assisted by the military officers. No
less than three times the same night Captain Johannes was warned about
a potential Arusha and Meru attack. The first warning came from Chief
Matunda who was dismissed as drunk. Twice more, however, Matunda,
59 The Holy Ghost Fathers, Spiritans or The Congregation of the Holy Ghost under the
Protection of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (CSSp) was founded in Paris in 1703.
Although the initial purpose of the founder Claude Francis Poullart des Places was to
provide the Catholic Church with priests, the Holy Ghost Fathers have made themselves
known as a mission society (Koren 1967, 70-71). The Catholic congregation in Arusha was
founded by the Holy Ghost Fathers in 1926. Until 1963 when the Diocese of Arusha was
founded, the Catholic work in the region formed a part of the Diocese of Moshi. Most of
the Spiritan Fathers working in the Diocese of Arusha were Americans or British (Catholic
Directory of Eastern Africa 1968-1969, 157; LeClair 1993, 60-61).
60 Müller 1936, 5-6, 13-14; Müller/Faßmann, ELMB 1897, 15. Mission Inspector Martin
Weishaupt admitted that the competition with the Catholics was a key reason why the
Leipzig Mission was so eager to found stations around Mount Meru (Weishaupt, ELMB
1912, 534).
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