Catholic Diocese Jalingo

The first missionaries that took the challenge to open a mission in Adamawa were the Irish Augustinian missionaries. The first three Augustinian missionaries arrived Nigeria in October 1938. They arrived at Jos to spend some time with their Society of Missionaries of Africa (hereafter SMA) colleagues. To be precise, they spend one year with the SMA and with the arrival of these Augustinian missionaries, it necessarily caused boundary adjustment and thus the boundary between the prefectures of Jos and Benue was adjusted, to bring all of Adamawa province under the jurisdiction of Msgr. William Lumley SMA, the Prefect Apostolic of Jos. At that time, that is around 1938 onwards Wukari was visited as an outstation from Gboko parish. Other outstations visited regularly include Donga, lbi, and Takum. In 1939, a Certificate of Occupancy was granted for the present compound in Wukari. The early community was made up of people of Cameroonian and Igbo origin. Wukari can thus claim to be the second oldest Catholic community in the Diocese. In 1941 Zing and the Mumuye districts were classified as ‘unsettled areas’ and hence no immediate Catholic missionary activity was undertaken for the time been. In February 1944, Irish Augustinians from Yola marked sites at Lau andJauro Yinu, villages not far from Jalingo. The first was abandoned because it became waterlogged in the rainy season. So the lot for the development of the Church in the area of Jalingo fell upon Jauro Yinu. A fathers’ house with a thatched roof was built and it was occupied on St. Augustine’s Day, August 28, 1945