Pastor Muro and Family
Pastor Anta Muro is the primary pastor at Kihesa Lutheran Church in Iringa. He appears to be in his late twenties or early thirties although no one asked him his age. He is married to Flora and they have twin sons, Peter and Simon, now age 4. When the St. Mark's group was in Iringa, Flora was not there. She was in Arusha going to school. We were able to meet her the last day we were in Tanzania, when we were in Arusha on our way to the airport. We met many families who were in this situation. Education is so important and institutions of higher learning are scarce so that one or the other in a married couple is often away attending school. Children are usually cared for by housegirls who live with the family.

Pastor Muro did not grow up in Iringa. He grew up in Machame, near Moshi at the base of Mt. Kilimanjaro. He attended agricultural college first has a degree in agriculture, and then decided to go to seminary. He has never been out of Tanzania. His wife Flora is from Iringa and was baptized at Kihesa Lutheran as a child.

The Lutheran Churches in Tanzania are organized somewhat differently from the churches, as we know here, in urban America. For example, there is a main church, Kihesa Lutheran, which is large and has the pastor as the leader. There are then "preaching points" or satellite churches which are located several miles away from the main church. These serve as worship centers for people who can't travel to the main church. Almost no one has a car and most people walk everywhere they need to go. Evangelists who serve full time on the staff of the church serve the preaching points. The main church and its geographical area are designated by the diocese, the governing body of the Lutheran Church in Tanzania, similar to our synod. There are two main Lutheran churches in Iringa, Kihesa is one of them. The geographical area surrounding the church is divided into neighborhoods. No other Lutheran churches can come into these neighborhoods. Each neighborhood has an elder on the church council, a youth leader, and several choirs each with their own director. All of the people who belong to the church live within their respective geographical neighborhoods. The total membership of Kihesa and her preaching points is about 6-8 thousand.

St. Mark's is bringing Pastor Muro to visit us in the month of April. He will arrive with Don and Eunice Fultz when they return on April 2. He will stay through Easter and the fundraising auction for Kihesa Youth Life Skills Center, which is on April 27. He wants to become computer literate while he is here.

The Kihesa travel group will be planning lodging and activities for Pastor Muro's visit. Several ideas discussed are: meeting with the sponsors of students, meeting with various groups at church (men's and women's groups, Bible Studies), meeting with the group that is planning a trip to Kihesa in 2004. We will be asking for your input in the weeks to come.

The next two pages are pictures of Pastor Muro and his family. Also included are various activities that we participated in with Pastor Muro.

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