In Rome, Ghana’s Cardinal Richard Kuuia Baawobr has died. Father André-Léon Simonart, the Secretary-General of the African Missionary Conference, sent a telegram on Sunday, November 27, saying that the 63-year-old Cardinal died in the hospital despite emergency care.
At 5:45 p.m., an ambulance took our confrere from the Generalate to Gemelli Hospital. At 6:25 p.m., we were told the terrible news. “May Richard rest in the peace of his Lord, whom he served with such love,” was part of the statement.
He used to be the Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Washington. In May, Pope Francis I made him a Cardinal.
In September 2022, Cardinal Baawobr had successful heart surgery at the Santo Spirito Hospital in Rome. This was just a few days before the event at the Vatican where Pope Francis was to give him a scarlet biretta.
In February 2016, it was announced that His Eminence Baawobr would replace His Lordship Paul Bemile as the 4th Bishop of Wa. Six (6) years later, in May 2018, he gave up his position as Superior General of the Missionaries of Africa (White Fathers).
He was the first person from Africa to be in charge.
His Eminence was chosen as President of the Symposium of Episcopal Conference of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM) at its 19th Plenary Session in Accra, Ghana, not long after he announced in August that he was being promoted to the office of Cardinal.
Cardinal Baawobr is the first Ghanaian to be President of the continental organization, which is made up of eight (8) regional conferences.
He took over for Philippe Cardinal Ouedraogo Nakellentuba as the metropolitan archbishop of Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso).
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