Legio Maria
The religious movement was initiated by repeated appearances of a mystic woman to several Catholic Church members delivering messages about the incarnation of the Son of God as a black man.
These appearances are said to have begun around 1938, almost simultaneous with the beginning of Edel Quinn's lay Catholic mission for the similarly named Legion of Mary to Africa.
By the early 1960s, the movement had assembled a good number of catechists, acolytes, and believers in a spiritual return of Jesus Christ.
Legio Maria was legally registered in Kenya in 1966 as a church, expanded massively in the late 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, and eventually spread to many countries in Africa, including Uganda, Tanzania, Congo, Zaire, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Sudan, and Nigeria.
[1] What is now Legio Maria started originally separated from the Catholic lay movement Legion of Mary as far back as 1938–1940.
[2]" In 1963 a movement of dissatisfied Catholics in south Nyanza Province left the Diocese of Kisii and formed the Legio Maria Church, or Legion of Mary Church, under the leadership of the Lodvikus Simeo Melkio Ondetto and an old mystic woman named Mama Maria.
[3] She is believed to have called a number of Catholics to the new movement by visionary appearances, telling them to look forward to her son who had come to Africa.
[4]: 66, 199 Government estimates at the time of the split from the Catholic Church stated that there were nearly 90,000 followers of Legio Maria.
[citation needed] While the Legio Maria Church began exclusively as a movement among the Luo people, it is now found all over Kenya and even has significant numbers of communities among the Turkana, Kalenjin, Kamba and Luhya peoples of Kenya and in Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, DRC, and Ethiopia.
"[6]: 159 According to Legio Maria leaders and researchers, the origins of the movement can be traced to the convergence of at least four separate events: the concealment by the Roman Catholic Church of 'the third secret of Fátima;' the visions of Mary to several people informing them of the coming of her son; Simeo Ondetto's supernatural attributes that established him as a spiritual leader; the coming of the Holy Spirit at the home of John Baru in Suna Migori and the Spirit's declaration that Simeo Ondetto is the incarnated son of God; and several miracles and wonders that accompanied the mission of Ondetto, Mary, and numberless Legio Prophets.
According to early adherents of Legio Maria, the Virgin Mary began appearing among the Luo people in the late 1920s.
At a time estimated to be around 1935, this woman was walking at Awendo market in South Nyanza, when an empathizing tailor known as Omollo who was the son of Nyunja of Alego, Udida, gave her a dress gift.
By the 1940s, this woman is claimed to have visited the Catholic parish of Nyandago and conversed with over five members of its clergy about the mission of Ondetto.
However, priests at Nyandago mission discounted the supposed apparitions, stating that Mary could not appear as a Black African.
Mary wandered throughout Luo land during this time, performing healings and other miracles; the church was officially organised "when the 90-year-old Mary and her adult spiritual Son, Simeo Ondetto, were reunited in Suna, South Nyanza followed by the coming of the Holy Spirit(Mount the World Has Opened to the Light).
This resulted in the confusion of Gaudencia Aoko, a prophet, with Mama Maria, the harbinger who prepared the world for the coming of her son.
Born in around 1926 to Luo parents, Margaret Aduwo and Obimbo Misumba, Simeo Ondetto grew up in Angoro village, Kano location, near the Nyanza-Rift Valley border.
According to his brother, Nelson Owino Obimbo, a Legio Maria Cardinal Dean (2011), Simeo was an extraordinary child.
[1] Ondetto left their home in Awasi as a young man, worked at Miwani Sugar Company in Western Kenya for a short duration before moving to Tanzania Mara to stay with his relatives there.
So far, there have been five such popes: By 2009, there were differences in Legio Maria that led to the consecration of a Cardinal Romanus Alphonse Ong'ombe, going against the order of succession placed by Simeo Ondetto and enforced by Our Lady.
Legio Maria believes in dispensations or times when God has stepped into human history after the fall of man.
To Legio Maria faithfuls, Simeo Ondetto, Jesus of Nazareth and Melchizedek are one and the same person incarnated during different dispensations of human history.
"[6] She concludes that the Legio Maria Church has "formulat[ed] their own version of an anti-racist black liberation theology," which is unique.
According to Dirven, there are also "rigorous and legalistic taboos to drinking, smoking, dancing and wearing shoes in holy places – trumpeted as the essence of a strict moral code.
Legio priests and church mothers wear black robes at requiem masses and at graveside services held in family compounds.
At happier times, black prayer beads are worn or carried by church mothers and priests as a metonym of power and ordained status.
The Legio specifically recognise the Catholic saints Catherine of Siena and Bernadette of Lourdes in regard to spiritual healing.
The saints Samson and Julian and the archangel Michael help to "guide Legios with gifts for exorcism and battling witchcraft.
Serving at the Asumbi Roman Catholic mission station in the 1930s, Chefa was "highly charismatic," engaging "in healing, exorcism, and the burning of paraphernalia associated with 'witchcraft.'"
