Photo of the Week: Father Cyprian Tansi

 

Father  Cyprian Michael Iwene Tansi was the first Nigerian and West African Monk. Born in Aguleri, Anambra State, he was ordained in 1937, after a teaching career,  serving as a priest in  4 parishes. 

He was known for being devoted and deeply spiritual, differing from several Nigerian priests at the time who joined the church mostly to escape poverty.  

In 1950, he joined a Trappist order of monks at the Mount St. Bernard Abbey in Leicestershire, England, living a life of deep prayer & manual labour as Brother Cyprian, until his death on the 20th of January, 1960. 

In 1988, his remains were exhumed from his grave at the Abbey and reburied near the  Cathedral of Onitsha, the church where he was ordained. In 1998, he was beatified  by Pope John Paul II, and his remains are now enshrined at the Cathedral Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity, Onitsha. January 20th is his feast day.