An investigation into the role of school chaplaincy in the concrete evangelisation of the youth in Nakulabye Parish, Kampala Archdiocese

Abstract

This work is an investigation into the role of school chaplaincy in the concrete evangelization of the youth in Nakulabye Parish, Kampala Archdiocese. The author was greatly disturbed by the big number of youth leaving the Catholic Church on grounds of lack of proper understanding of the Catholic doctrine and inadequate evangelization. The challenge was that most of the youth, while still for infant catechism, they just parrot the doctrine for purposes of progress. The parents of most of the youth have little time with their children as they work for long hours and most of the youth of school going age spend most of their time at school. Unfortunately, the parents who have some little time with their children are not grounded in catechism and catholic doctrine. This created a very big gap that most of the youth grow up not firm in faith, catechism and Catholic doctrine. Many of the youth therefore have fallen victim to new appealing sects, manipulative preachers, misleading social trends and peer pressure. This pushed the researcher to investigate ways in which the youth can be concretely evangelized hence delving into school chaplaincy as a solution. The general objective of the work is to show the vital need of chaplains in schools and all institutions of learning for concrete evangelization. The researcher has used the different research methods like questionnaires, interviews and observations to get information from the field and library study to get relevant information from the different authors who have written about the same or similar investigation. After a thorough study, collection of field information, sorting and analyzing it, the researcher found out that for the concrete evangelisation of the youth, it is a collective work of chaplains, parents, Church, school administrators, teaching and support staff and the students/youth. The school chaplains to be successful in the concrete evangelisation of the youth need the support of all the stake holders concerned and each promptly fulfilling his or her obligation. The researcher has recommended a united effort of all stake holders to cooperate so as to concretely evangelize the youth especially starting with school chaplaincies.