The Sodality of St Cecilia is a group of catholic men and women, both young and old, who have the zeal in serving God with their lives. The sodality attracts and admits to it men and women who have intentions of becoming members and have completed their sacraments of initiation(baptism,holy communion and Confirmation).
The sodality is the support to the Priest in all services and celebrations of the mother church. Its mandate is to make sure that in these holy celebrations people of God have full and active participation in the sacred liturgy,and to nourish the services to have spiritual uplifting essence and be pleasing to the Lord.
For this to be possible, the sodality is dependent of three pillars to help it move on being;Word of God(Holy Scriptures),Prayer and Sacred music(praise and worship). Through these pillars the sodality aims at bringing people of God close to their creator,to surrender their lives unto Him,and to cultivate the spirit of praising and worshiping their God.
St. Cecilia sodality was introduced first in Botswana, Gaborone Diocese in St. Conrad’s Parish, under the stewardship of Rev Fr. Columba Kelly CP, in the year 1992 by Mr. Sialala Mooketsi who by then was a full member of the sodality in the diocese of Johannesburg (Our lady of the dolors).
In the year 1993,1994 the members collaborated with their counterparts from South Africa in the Klerksdorp diocese and attended their first retreat,with the aim of learning and familiarizing themselves with the sodality and its procedures and processes.
In 1995 St Cecilia attended a retreat in the Johannesburg diocese,and in the following year(1996) the sodality from Klerksdorp Diocese arranged for a retreat to be held in Botswana, Gaborone Diocese at St Theresa Parish,where the first batch of members were admitted as full members of the sodality and were en-robed in the same retreat. Despite all these the sodality was not officially accepted in the church even though it existed.
The years 2001, 2002, 2003 under the stewardship of the then, Rev Fr. John Hamathi, were the years where considerations to accept the sodality in the Parish intensified,where members were requested to lay off set aside their sodality garment. In August the Bishop with the Priest admitted and accepted the sodality in the Parish and the diocese as a sodality that supports(uplifts)music.
This led the sodality to seeing its members being officially en-robed as full members in February 23 2003. At the time the sodality was using gowns as their identification uniform before it was later changed to the current one in 2016. The sodality has now spread to various parishes being;St Bernard’s,St Veronica,St Theresa, Thapelong, Our Lady of the Rosary,Holy Cross, Kreste Lefika,St Placid,Scared heart as well as St Patrick’s in the diocese of Francistown.