Episcopal Press and News

NAMIBIA: Former bishop and human rights advocate James Kauluma dies at 75

Episcopal News Service. April 19, 2007 [041907-02]

The Rt. Rev. James Kauluma, the former and longest-serving bishop of Namibia, died April 16 after battling with prostrate cancer for several years. He was 75.

Kauluma was greatly admired for his courage and determination on behalf of Namibia and her people. He served as the sixth Anglican Bishop of Namibia from 1981 to 1998 and led the church through the liberation struggle under apartheid in South Africa, which ruled Namibia -- formerly South West Africa -- under a League of Nations mandate dating from the end of World War I until the country's independence in 1990.

Kauluma was steadfast in his advocacy of an independent Namibia and made numerous trips to the United States and Europe as a spokesperson for the rights of Namibians living under the yoke of apartheid.

"Bishop James was a courageous leader who regularly braved the landmine roads of northern Namibia to worship with his isolated congregations in the 1980s," said the Rev. Canon Brian J. Grieves, director of Peace and Justice Ministries for the Episcopal Church, and an Honorary Canon of the Diocese of Namibia. "He will be remembered as the bishop who provided pastoral and prophetic leadership to his flock at probably the most critical and violent time in the history of the diocese."

Grieves has visited Namibia several times and was made honorary canon in 1994 at St. George's Cathedral in Namibia's capital, Windhoek. He recalled Kauluma once saying in a sermon, "We are a suffering but singing Church."

"For his steadfast leadership he is an icon of the anti-apartheid era," Grieves said. "I am sure Namibia is grieving his passing today."

Born in 1932, Kauluma was the first indigenous bishop of the Anglican Church in Namibia. He was elected suffragan bishop of Namibia in 1977, and was consecrated bishop in England in January 1978 when he returned to Namibia after having lived abroad for 12 years. After the death of then-Bishop Colin Winter in 1981 he was elected diocesan bishop, the first Namibian to hold that office. In April 1983, Kauluma received an honorary Doctorate of Divinity degree from General Theological Seminary in New York City.

He is survived by his wife Sally, two daughters Nangula and Nangado, and grandchildren.

Funeral arrangements have yet to be announced.