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Catholic Bishops in Burkina Faso Lift COVID-19 Restrictions on Church Activities

The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Immaculation Conception in Ouagadougou. | Rita Willaert via Flickr (CC BY-NC 2.0).

By Jude Atemanke

Dablo, 01 December, 2023 / 8:50 pm (ACI Africa).

Catholic Bishops in Burkina Faso have lifted COVID-19 restrictions during Eucharistic celebrations in the West Africa nation.

In a statement issued Wednesday, November 29, members of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Burkina Faso and Niger (CEBN) thanked God “who has answered the prayers of his children by preserving them from this pandemic.”

“We the Bishops of Burkina Faso have discussed the anti-COVID measures that had been taken for our liturgical assemblies and other pastoral or spiritual activities during our Plenary Assemblies of June and November 2023 and have decided to lift these measures with effect from Thursday 30 November 2023,” CEBN members said.

They added, “Each Local Ordinary is responsible for communicating the present decision to his faithful and for its application in the ecclesiastical circumscription for which he is responsible.”

The Catholic Bishops encouraged the faithful to “always observe the hygiene instructions.”

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CEBN members implored, “Let us pray unceasingly that He will bring unity and peace to our country. May the intercession of Blessed Mary and Saint Joseph, her most chaste Spouse, obtain for us a fruitful pastoral year.”

Restrictions related to COVID-19 in Burkina Faso had been in place since March 2020 at the height of the pandemic.

The Burkinabe government lifted the COVID-19 restrictions in June this year, citing a “decrease in the number of cases and deaths in our country”, the Bishops said.

 “At the Council of Ministers meeting on 7 June 2023, the Government of Burkina Faso lifted the compulsory hygiene, prophylaxis and freedom-restriction measures taken as part of the response to the Covid-19 pandemic, in view of the decrease in the number of cases and deaths in our country,” the Catholic Bishops said.

In May 2023, the World Health Organisation (WHO) had declared that Covid-19 no longer constituted a public health emergency of international concern.

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Jude Atemanke

Jude Atemanke is a Cameroonian journalist with a passion for Catholic Church communication. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of Buea in Cameroon. Currently, Jude serves as a journalist for ACI Africa.

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