Fr Jesus Benoit BADJI - Provincial Superior of the "Our Lady of Peace" Province-AON

Fr BADJI - AON Provincial for 2022-2028

28 December 2021

(ANS - Rome) - On Friday 24 December 2021, the Rector Major, Fr Ángel Fernández Artime, with the consent of his Council, appointed Fr Jesus Benoit BADJI as Provincial Superior of the "Our Lady of Peace" Province in North West Africa (AON) for 2022-2028. 

The Province of "Our Lady of Peace" is one of the three new circumscriptions canonically erected by the Rector Major, and Fr Jesus Benoit will be its first Provincial. It extends for more than 3000 km, from Benin to Senegal, and will thus include, from east to west, Benin, the future seat of the new district, Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea Conakry, Gambia, Senegal. This new province inherits a Delegation that was based in the Malian capital Bamako, and which will now be in Dakar, as Mali will no longer be part of the new AON Delegation. The list of confreres of this new province is not yet exhaustive. However, last August, 111 confreres decided in favor of membership of the AON, 104 of them for permanent membership.

Fr Jesus Benoit was born on 21 February 1974 in Tambacounda, Senegal. He is the son of Nicolas Badji and Joséphine Sambou. He made his novitiate in Gbodjomé (Togo), his first vows on September 8, 1999, and his perpetual vows on 30 July 2005 in his hometown of Tambacounda. During his theological studies in Yaoundé, he was lecturer in 2006, acolyte in 2007 and deacon on June 29, 2008. At the end of his formation at the Ecole Théologique Saint Cyprien in Ngoya (Yaoundé, Cameroon), he returned to the province (AFO) and was ordained a priest on 17 July 2009 in Tambacounda.

Fr Jesus Benoit was in Zogbo (Cotonou) from 2002 to 2004, in Cameroon, the Theologate of St. Augustine, from 2005 to 2010, and the years and various experiences have brought him, above all, to Togo, first in 1999, then in 2004 and, since his ordination, to the Maria Auxiliadora Parish of Gbényédzi from 2010 to 2013, at the Maison Don Bosco – the Salesian post-novitiate - from 2013 to 2017, and finally to the Blessed Philip Rinaldi Novitiate of Gbodjomé from 2017, where he was at the time of this present nomination.

Fr Jesus-Benoit has accumulated experience at the local and provincial level. He was a member of the local council of Gbenyedzi, became economer of the post-novitiate of Akodessewa, rector of the aforementioned post-novitiate, and economer of ISPSH Don Bosco, now ISDB. At the provincial level, from 2005 to 2013, he was responsible for the delegation of Social Communication, then for Youth Ministry in the Eastern sector and, practically from 2013, responsible for formation as a delegate, and then as Provincial Vicar from 20 April 2016. Fr Jesus-Benoit is currently a PhD student in Philosophy.