ASTORIA — By the time he reached high school in Kenya, Father Samuel Mwiwawi was already considering the priesthood, even though he had not yet experienced the joys of belonging to a parish.
His father worked for Nairobi-based National Cereals and Produce Board, which stationed him in remote agricultural areas across Kenya, far from any parish.
Consequently, young Samuel Mwiwawi and his six siblings didn’t experience Christmas Day Mass until his parents settled in his father’s ancestral homeland of Taita, about 75 miles northwest of Mombasa.
The siblings still come to Christmas Mass at Holy Rosary Parish in Mwanda, Taita-Taveta County — but only when they can.
Father Mwiwawi, ordained last June, is parochial vicar for Immaculate Conception Parish in Astoria. His brothers and sisters all settled with their own families in Nairobi, about 200 miles farther north of their father’s homeland.
“It’s very expensive to go home at this time,” he said. “Some of my brothers and sisters have not gone because they have to be at work.”
Still, this tight-knit family holds on to Christmas memories of years past at Holy Rosary Parish, a tiny stucco-and-brick church nestled into a brush-covered hillside.
There was no midnight Mass for the family, Father Mwiwawi said, because the roads are not maintained well, and there are no streetlights.
So, they attended Mass on Christmas morning, dressed in their Sunday best.
Traditional Christmas hymns are the soundtrack but sung in Swahili or the Taita dialect.
At this church, the family can now marvel at elegant Christmas trees and Nativity scenes. Such decor was nowhere to be seen when siblings were just tykes in the far-flung rural areas of Kenya.
At Enosane, about 185 miles northwest of Nairobi, the parents created Christmas traditions for their young children.
“The only times that we could drink soda were Christmas and Easter,” Father Mwiwawi said, laughing. “My dad would bring home a whole crate — Coca-Cola and Fanta, the orange one.”
His mother prepared a meal of stewed chicken or goat. She baked a Christmas cake and biscuits in a makeshift oven of two pots stacked together, with burning charcoal beneath it and atop the lid.
“And we used to dance,” Father Mwiwawi said. “My brother and I would compete at dancing on that day.”
But even though these children had no access to a parish, they still understood the true meaning of Christmas — the celebration of Jesus coming into the world. Their mother, deeply committed to the Catholic faith, made sure of that.
“My mom was very spiritual,” Father Mwiwawi said. “And despite not going to church we would pray at home. My dad would be right there listening, because my dad is Anglican.”
Father Mwiwawi has credited his parents and siblings for noticing in him a desire to serve God and his people. They encouraged him to become a priest.
It was not an instant decision for him, but a seed firmly planted while he attended St. Mary’s Seminary, a boarding school 20 miles southwest of Mombasa. From there, he would go home on holidays to see the rest of his family in Taita.
After Christmas Mass, the family continued their traditions at home, with sodas, dancing, and cake.
The family never exchanged presents in those earlier days or even after they began attending Holy Rosary Parish. Gift-giving simply is not part of Christmas in Kenya, Father Mwiwawi said.
“I come from a humble family,” he said.
Editor’s note: This is the fourth in a series of six articles where priests in the diocese who come from other countries reflect on their boyhood parishes and hometowns at Christmas.