The husband tells how the Pastor, Kantate, has said goodbye to him
The accident occurred yesterday, August 4, 2024, Pastor Kantate Munis (42) and Congregation Elder, Laban Kweka (50) died while returning from a singing performance at Gezaulole Congregation, Hai District.
Pastor Israel Moshi, who is the husband of Pastor Kantate Munis, who died in the accident, tells how he said goodbye to his wife the morning before going to the service.
God has hidden a great secret in death. That is what you can say after the Pastor of the Kimashuku Congregation, Evangelical Lutheran Church of Tanzania (ELCT) in Hai District, Kilimanjaro Region, Kantate Munis died in an accident, a few hours after asking her husband, who is also a pastor, Israel Moshi, to wear her pastoral robe to go and give services.
Pastor Munis and her elder brother, Kweka, died yesterday, Sunday, August 4, 2024, after the car they were traveling in, coming from the Gezaulole Congregation in Hai district, was hit by a passenger bus, while turning a corner to enter the church congregation where she lives.
Recounting how he said goodbye to his wife in the morning, Pastor Moshi said that as they were preparing to go to the service, his wife told him that she was not happy with the service clothing he was wearing (mantle), so she asked him to take it off and then put on her service robe.
He explained that this was unusual for them to happen and, in his interpretation, it was as if she was saying goodbye to him and handing over her service to him.
"On Sundays, we are used to waking up at 11 am, so we woke up early, but in an unusual environment we found ourselves joking more than we usually were used to waking up and being 'serious' and leaving," he said.
He said that despite flirting, they argued about who would go out with the children that day and in the end, they could not reach an agreement, but since he was going to a service further away, he had to leave his mother and the children.
"But when I was leaving, she told me she didn't like my ministry robe very much, she would prefer that from now on I use her ministry robe which is in her office, so she stopped me until she made sure I left with her ministry robe, which is unusual, in my interpretation it was as if she was saying goodbye to me or handing over his ministry to me," said Pastor Moshi.
He said that when he left, he went straight to the church where he was serving the previous day at the Kiwalaa Congregation along with the diocesan leaders who were present.
"At 6pm I was told that something urgent had happened in the family and I had to be informed, and that's when I was told that my wife had been in a serious accident and had passed away."
"I was given the story of what happened, that the small car she was driving was hit by a Shabiby company bus as she was entering the church's entrance to the house where she serves," said Moshi.
He said he is currently praying to God to give him strength and health, so that he can face the difficult times he is going through.
"I believe God will empower me as He has empowered others, because during my pastoral period I have seen people bereaved, leaving behind young children, young wives, young husbands, so I will join this group as God wills and I will fight in my turn. I believe God will allow me to reach where He wants me to reach, so that I can raise these children of mine that He left behind for me," he said and added;
"I left behind four young children, they are very unhappy and have very difficult questions about their mother because they remained playing with her when I left home, but in their minds, they did not think it was a simple thing to happen that their mother would be called to heaven."
Source Article from: Mwananchi
PS:
The incident happened shortly after Kantate approved our wedding rings and blessed us (Ester and Radoslav).
Until Kantate's death, we attended every Sunday service.
Traffic between Arusha and Moshi is very heavy in the evening. There were no drivers’ errors in the accident. Both drivers were moving in the same direction when put on their right turn signals, the pastor to turn into the church and the bus to overtake several vehicles. They started the maneuver at about the same time, so there was no chance of anyone preventing the collision.