Rev. Father Andrew Campbell is sounding the alarm that parents have to make time for their wards lest their children whom they are toiling to fend for end up as drug addicts or social misfits.
He charged parents to reduce their funeral attendance schedules and other social functions making time to come home early from work, play and eat with them.
“Parents must remember that their wards do not want phones, tablets from them first but rather love,” adding “the destruction of a child starts from the home; reason why parents must interact with each other with respect to serve as example to the children.”
Father Campbell stunned patrons at the Alisa Hotel conference room when he revealed young children in class 5 were already in WhatsApp groups where pornographic photos and videos were freely shared.
“I have never seen such likes before,” the Irish missionary gasped at the carols night.
“Sit with your kids, talk with them. A family which prays together, stays together for 2019,” he admonished adding it’s shameful that family folks could share same living quarters yet not talk with each other because of a perceived wrong.
Reverend Father Campbell came to Ghana on October 13, 1971 as an Irish SVD missionary from his native, Dublin, Ireland where he was born on March 27, 1946.
He’s been involved with the Princess Marie Louise Children’s Hospital, Accra since 1977 and been involved with the leprosarium at Weija for 24 years.
At the Children’s Hospital, GHc42,000 is needed for building an extra unit to accommodate sick children who are over crowed in the various wards.
Campbell explains Princess Marie; the granddaughter of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom cut the sod for the construction of the 82-bed hospital, the only children’s hospital in the country.
Campbell narrates that he was fortunate enough to have great parents and a sister growing up but now sees too many broken families leading to children sleeping in the open and getting exposed to many hazards.
“We started a soup kitchen 2 years ago feeding 60 children every day,” he submitted. With funds more could be fed extending the project to children in Suhum, Kumasi and Takoradi.
Poverty features as one key breaker of homes as parents don’t have the means to send wards to school.
“I was shocked when I saw very young children using wee, heroine and cocaine but more worrisome is some of them telling him they go to the cemeteries and mortuary to collect waste water to sniff with their cocaine for a more potent effect.”
But the drug menace knows not only poor folks but also grabs even wealthy ones in its fold.
Father Campbell is rallying support for the lepers in the Central Region who need a housing unit to be erected for them.
Father Campbell studied Philosophy and Theology obtaining a Bachelor of Divinity Degree from St. Patrick’s College in the UK on October 20, 1970.
He was ordained a Catholic priest on December 1970.
He is now famed for his work with lepers but like many of us, his first encounter with a leper was when a man came to the Holy Spirit Cathedral 47 years ago to sell mangoes but was frightened and bemused.
He holds a Ghanaian citizenship since 2013 going by the name Nii Lantey. He is a Management Committee member of the of Princess Marie Louise Children’s Hospital, Accra.
By Michael Eli Dokosi/goldstreetbusiness.com
