For the past 16 years, Fr. Frank Lubowa, a pastor at Holy Family Catholic Church in St. Petersburg, has created an organization called the Good Samaritan Mission of Uganda to help the children in Uganda who don’t have easy access to education. He has done amazing things for the children of his home town who were in need of support. Through his works, and the help of many other charitable and compassionate people, the children now have school buildings, school supplies, uniforms, teachers and student housing, fresh water and access to a monthly medical clinic for vaccines, medicine and other medical treatment.
Fr. Frank is from Uganda, and wanted to do as much as he could to help the children living there. His grandmother, Theresa, ran an orphanage on her property in Uganda near Lake Victoria. Back in 2009, she would see orphans on the street and bring them in to take care of them. As time went by, she brought more children to her home, and realized that they needed an education in order to have a future. She found teachers that would come to teach the children, but it was a challenge. It all depended upon the weather because they didn’t have any buildings to conduct class at that time. She looked to her grandson for help to build a more suitable school. It was at this point Fr. Frank began his mission to establish a Catholic School, but he couldn’t do it alone. At the time he was a priest at Espiritu Santo Catholic Church in Safety Harbor. He asked Ellen Jones, faith formation and adult enrichment, to work with him to seek donations to help not only grow the school but build much needed buildings to hold classes.
In 2018, sponsors from Espiritu Santo Catholic Church raised enough money to start construction of the school, which would be called St. Theresa’s. As time went by, they were able to hire more teachers and add on to the building. Now, they have five or six classroom buildings, an auditorium, a teacher lounge, teacher quarters, hostels for the students to board, fencing around the school, and just last year they were able to install electricity. Currently, they have over 500 students, and since the teachers are able to live on school grounds, they attract better teachers which gives the students better schooling, giving them a better chance to be able to move on to a higher education.
“We have a number of students, at the primary seven grade level, take the test to be able to get into higher education. If they test high enough they can earn a scholarship. I believe, last year we had two that were able to do that. And that doesn’t happen all the time. I think some of that had to do with the fact that we were able to get electricity in the building, and because of that, they are able to study at night,” said Jones.
The school is achieving great success and is seeing overall higher test scores from their students, which is an incredible achievement in such a short amount of time.
In 2019, at Espiritu Santo Catholic School, several eighth grade students, who are Academy alum, ran a school wide walk-a-thon to raise money for the Good Samaritan Mission. Academy girls, Kaitlin McHugh (A‘23), Sara O’Connor (A‘23), Sarah Aschenbrenner (A‘23), Elliana Benson (A‘23), Sophie Odmark (A‘23), and Isabella Justin (A‘25) decided to help Fr. Frank raise money to support the students at St. Theresa’s Catholic School. He was a beloved priest at Espiritu, and the girls wanted to do as much as they could to help him and his organization.
“Fr. Frank’s passion and love for his kids really made me want to help. The story of how he started his orphanage on his grandmother’s land given to him, helping him and seeing his reaction and pure joy made me feel so fulfilled and want to continue to help him and the kids he deeply cares for. I think that being in Catholic schools makes it our responsibility to look out for the kids who share our beliefs but feel alone in the world. We need to follow the Word of God and look out for those who are poor or vulnerable,” said McHugh.
“Serving Fr. Frank and his ministry was not up for debate. The light of Christ shows fervently through him, it’s hard to say no to him or the children in Uganda. I don’t remember much during our time planning and coordinating the walk-a-thon as we were in 8th grade, but looking back on it, I can say it was so fulfilling and allowed us to see the joy of the Gospel unfold through service towards others. As part of the Body of Christ, we are obligated to serve others in need and we did just that. Supporting other Catholic students is a mission – the very mission Jesus Christ left us to do after his resurrection. The Catholic Church is universal, meaning that those in need are our brothers and sisters in Christ. We are called to serve them every day,” said O’Connor.
Looking to the future, some of the upcoming challenges are that many current sponsors are aging and are not able to support the school as they were in the past. They have to solicit new donors or cut back on what they were planning to do.
Donating here helps the school in more ways than you can ever imagine. By donating as little as $300, a student receives full tuition, school supplies, a new uniform, and two hot meals a day for an entire year.
“There are people out there that need support and whatever you can do would help. Prayers and financial support mean all the difference,” said Jones.
