The Congregation of the Holy Spirit (Spiritans) is an international Religious Congregation working in 65 countries dedicated in serving the poor and underprivileged anywhere the church will call upon them. Fr. Francis Tandoh is a member of the Congregation from Ghana. West Africa. He worked in the missionary area  of the Gambia. He is currently ministering in three parishes in Dayton under the Archdiocese of Cincinnati. He will speak to us about his mission work and vocations in Africa. The proceeds from the appeals will go to help the missionary work of the  Spiritans working in difficult war-torn areas like Congo and for the training of over 80 seminarians, in the Holy Ghost seminary in Ghana and Nigeria. The Holy Ghost Fathers are devoted in working with the less advantage people.

Background Information:
The Congregation of the Holy Spirit, popular known as the Holy Ghost Fathers or Spiritans, is an International Missionary Society.The Holy Ghost Fathers (Spiritans) was founded in France in 1703, by Claude Poullart De Places.  It was given its present world wide missionary thrust in 1848 by Venerable Francis Libermann who was also French and a convert from Judaism.

This Congregation was established to work with the disadvantage, needy and the abandoned.  We work in difficult places where the Church finds it difficult to get personnel to work.

The late Pope John Paul II, on his pilgrimage to Africa repeatedly stressed the need for Africans to be missionaries, “not only in their own countries, but outside, and, in particular, to other African countries.”  The Missionary Congregation of the Holy Spirit has undertaken this task, more than 2000 Africans are in formation with about 1000 members on active missionary service. Several missionary provinces has emerged, the Spiritan Province of Nigeria, Angola and Kenya,Tanzania, Kogi and to mention a few.

In 1978, the West African Foundation was formed to accept  candidates from Senegal, the Gambia, Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Ghana, which  became a province in 2000.  Her first members were ordained in 1986. They were four members.  Since then, we have ordained more than 200 others. In 2009 the West Africa Province was grouped into three circumscriptions, The Province of Ghana, Gambia Foundation and the Foundation of Sierra Leone, because of the growth in numbers. Right now, the Province of Ghana has her members working in mission areas like Guinea in West Africa, attending to the needs of the refugees from Sierra-Leone. In Malawi, members are working with the abandoned, like the (A.I.D.S.) patients.  In the Gambia, members evangelize by bearing witness to the Muslim community, and trying to restore the image of the female population they relegate in a male dominated culture. Spiritans are presently working in Sierra-Leone, Liberia, Northern Nigeria, Northern Ghana, and Benin and recently in Taiwan (Asia).

The Province of Ghana has its headquarters in Ghana.  The Novitiate is in Sierra Leone and Philosophy house is in Ghana that now has about 77 students.The Theology house is in Nigeria, West Africa. Our cost for maintaining and caring for a student which includes food, medical, clothing and tuition is approximately $5,000.00 per annum.

The Congregation of the Holy Spirit has about three thousand members working in all continents in sixty-five countries of the world.