We are still nursing the wounds of those scarred by that attack
Four years after gunmen killed 41 worshippers and wounded more than 100 at St Francis Catholic Church in Owo, Ondo State, the community they shattered continues its slow, uncertain passage through grief. The Federal High Court has sentenced four of the five attackers to death — a legal conclusion that the bishop of the Ondo Diocese receives not as closure, but as one incomplete answer to a wound that remains open. In the space between justice and healing, the diocese tends to orphaned children, widowed families, and scarred survivors, holding together a community that discovered, on a Sunday morning in June 2022, that sacred spaces are not exempt from the cruelties of the world.
- Four years on, the June 5, 2022 massacre at a Catholic church during Sunday prayers remains an unhealed rupture — 41 dead, over 100 wounded, and a community still living inside the aftermath.
- A Federal High Court this week sentenced four of five attackers to death, delivering legal accountability but leaving the bishop to ask why a diocese devoted to hospitals, free care, and youth empowerment was deliberately targeted.
- One seminarian in the bishop's care lost both parents in the attack — a single human detail that concentrates the scale of loss the diocese now carries as an indefinite responsibility.
- The bishop holds forgiveness and legal justice as parallel obligations, not contradictions — insisting the law must hold even as faith calls for mercy, and that God remains the final judge.
- The real measure of recovery, in the diocese's telling, is not the courtroom verdict but the daily work: raising orphans, treating wounds, and sustaining a community whose sense of safety was permanently altered.
Four years ago tomorrow, gunmen entered St Francis Catholic Church in Owo during Sunday morning prayers and opened fire. When the shooting ended, 41 worshippers were dead and more than 100 others carried wounds — physical and psychological — that would permanently alter their lives and their faith community.
This week, a Federal High Court in Abuja sentenced four of the five attackers to death. For Bishop Jude Arogundade of the Ondo Diocese, the verdict is a form of justice — but not a restoration. He speaks of June 5, 2022, not as a moment that has passed but as a rupture still defining the present. Among those now in his care is a seminarian who lost both parents in the attack. The diocese runs hospitals, free medical services, and youth programs that serve the wider community regardless of faith — and yet none of it prevented the violence.
The bishop believes the attack was planned and sponsored, a deliberate act rather than a random one. The question of who ultimately orchestrated it remains, in his view, unresolved in any way that truly matters. He holds two positions simultaneously and without contradiction: that Christian teaching calls for forgiveness, and that the law of the land must be upheld. Both, he says, are necessary tracks for a wounded community moving forward.
Four years later, the diocese is still nursing its scars — raising the children of the dead, treating the injured, and holding space for a community that learned on a quiet Sunday morning that prayer offers no guarantee of safety. The work of care continues, with no clear end in sight.
Tomorrow marks four years since gunmen entered St Francis Catholic Church in Owo, Ondo State, during Sunday morning prayers and opened fire on the congregation. When the shooting stopped, 41 worshippers lay dead and more than 100 others bore wounds—physical and otherwise—that would reshape the landscape of their lives and their faith community.
The Federal High Court in Abuja has now sentenced four of the five attackers to death, a legal reckoning that arrived this week. But for Bishop Jude Arogundade of the Ondo Diocese, the verdict carries a weight that cannot balance what was lost. He speaks of the attack on June 5, 2022, not as a moment that has passed but as a rupture that continues to define the present. The church remains a place of worship, yes, but also a place where the bishop and his community move through each day tending to the aftermath: orphaned children, widows without partners, survivors whose bodies and minds carry the memory of terror in what should have been the safest of spaces.
One seminarian under the bishop's care lost both parents in the attack. The diocese operates hospitals and social programs that serve the broader community regardless of faith. It runs youth empowerment initiatives and provides free medical care to those without means. Yet none of this prevented the violence. The bishop finds himself asking a question that has no satisfying answer: why would anyone target an institution devoted to healing and care?
He believes the attack was not random but planned and sponsored—a deliberate act of violence against a specific place. The question of who orchestrated it and why remains, in his telling, unresolved in any way that matters. The law has taken its course, he acknowledges. Justice, of a sort, has been served. But no sentence can restore the 41 lives that were taken, and no verdict can undo the work the diocese must now do indefinitely: raising the children of the dead, treating the wounds of the injured, holding space for a community that learned on a Sunday morning that prayer offers no protection.
The bishop speaks from a position of faith, invoking forgiveness as a Christian teaching and accepting that God remains the ultimate judge of human actions. Yet he also insists that the law of the land must hold. These are not contradictory positions in his mind—they are the two tracks on which a wounded community must learn to move forward. The attack has become, as he says, a life-changer not only for Catholics in Ondo but for the entire state. Four years later, the diocese is still nursing the scars. The work of care continues, day after day, with no clear end in sight.
Citações Notáveis
The attack has been a life changer for us in the Catholic diocese of Ondo and, indeed, in the whole of Ondo State.— Bishop Jude Arogundade
No judicial outcome can restore the 41 brutally murdered lives.— Bishop Jude Arogundade
A Conversa do Hearth Outra perspectiva sobre a história
When the bishop says the attack was "sponsored," what does he mean by that?
He's suggesting this wasn't a spontaneous act of violence—that someone planned it, decided on the target, and carried it out with intention. He's troubled by the fact that no clear motive or perpetrator has been publicly identified in a way that satisfies him.
But four attackers have been sentenced to death. Doesn't that answer the question?
It answers part of it. The men who pulled the triggers have been held accountable. But the bishop seems to be asking: who sent them? Who decided a Catholic church in Owo was worth attacking? That question feels unresolved to him.
He mentions the church does hospitals, free care, youth programs. Is he saying the attack was political?
He's saying it doesn't make sense from any angle he can see. If it were about the church's faith, he'd expect attacks on many churches. If it were about the community, he'd expect attacks on secular institutions. The randomness—or what feels like randomness to him—is part of what haunts him.
How does forgiveness fit into what he's saying?
It's his faith speaking. He believes Christians are called to forgive, and he's trying to live that. But forgiveness doesn't mean the law shouldn't work. Both things are true at once—he forgives, and he also expects the state to enforce justice.
What's the real measure of justice for him, then?
Not the death sentences, though he accepts them. The real measure is whether the diocese can keep caring for the orphans and the wounded. Whether the community can heal. That's what he's focused on now.