INTRODUCTION
The Diocese of Central Tanganyika was carved from the Diocese of Mombasa,Kenya in 1926 and inaugurated as a Diocese in 1927 when its first Bishop,George Chambers from Australia was consecrated. Bishop Chambers retired in 1946 and was succeeded by Bishop Wynne Jones from Australia who died in 1951 from a car accident and was buried in Dar es Salaam. Bishop Alfred Stanway from Australia served as bishop of thisdiocese from 1951 until 1971 when Bishop Yohana Madindathe first Tanzanian diocesan Bishop succeeded him. Bishop G. Mdimi Mhogolo is the current bishop from 1989.The legal status of the Diocese is that of a charity organization which was registered in 1955 under the Societies ordinance of Tanganyika.

The mission of the Diocese is to communicate in wordand deed the love of God to everyone in the Diocese whatever theircondition, so that they:
          • May know him as Saviour 
          • Be committed to him as Lord
          • Live under the truth ofhis Word
          • Rejoice together in thefellowship of his Spirit
          • Worship him as their Father
          • and go out with this message ofJesus Christ’s love to others

About the Diocese

The Area
The Diocese of Central Tanganyika boundary covers Dodoma Urban and Rural with a population of over 1.2 million people, with a membership of over 500000 Anglicans.

Physical Characteristics
The entire area of DCT is of peneplain with hill ranges. A warm semiarid savannah climate and the temperatures range from 20degrees Celsius to 31. In general, the soil within the area is considered to be of low fertility, deficient in organic materials, moderate to poor permeability and of shallow depth. The average rainfall annually is between 500-600mm with an evaporation of over 2000 mm per annum. There is a four-month rainfall period [December- March], which is unevenly distributed within the area. The rainfalls are unpredictable and infrequent within the four months that so often lead to crop failure. The people’s GDP is US$ 160 per year

Socio-economic characteristics
The majority of the people in this region are engaged in agriculture andlivestock production. However their level of production is still of asubsistence nature and the transition from subsistence to market economy isvery slow due to various reasons which include: inadequate social economicinfrastructures, low agricultural technology, lack of agricultural capitalinputs and implements, and a low education base. Other problems that facepeople include the rapid degradation of the fragile environment due to poormanagement of the soil, overpopulation, urbanization and water shortages.

DIOCESAN PROGRAMMES ANDACTIVITIES

Pastoral Care
The Diocese has four strong diocesan organizations whose aims are to nurture, serve, affirm and encouragethese special groups in their development into a healthy and promising existence.About the Diocese

Children:
To help church leaders and parents see the importance, needs and rights of children and to provide adequate teaching for both adults and children to meet these needs, and to help Christians understand the importance and implications of Jesus Christ's command: "Let the childrencome to me and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such asthese." There are over 600 children's groups [Sunday Schools] in the Diocesewith over 30,000 children.

Youth:
To encourage, help and support youngpeople in their growth to become responsible people within theircommunities, and to help young people tackle youth problems. There are over340 groups with membership of over 9000 people.

Women:
To promote equality and human dignity in the lives of women andchildren in society, and to assist and enhance women in development and topromote income generating projects which will enable them to care for theirfamilies. To promote family values, marriage and the nurture children in thefaith. There are 230 groups with over 5000 members

Men:
To meet special needs of men over 50years most of them live in abject poverty and die without hope, we havestarted this organization last year 2001 with the aims of: providingmaterial and spiritual support and help, enhance their dignity and hope,encourage them to reach their age group men with the Good News and keeptheir voice in the church and society going and heard. After one year wehave 70 groups with a population of 2400 members.

Christian Education
In orderto be, exist and continue to be a diocese, we have to grow and have leaderswho are well equipped for the advancement of Christianity and the welfare ofall people. We have two institutions that produce men and women who carryout God’s activities in our parishes. We aim at producing men and women whoare sensitive to people’s spirituality and can carry out effectively allspiritual activities that enhance and humanize humanity so that the wholecreation may reach its full potential.

Worship
Our aim isto worship the creator and not the created, the one beyond us and not humanbeings or the like. We look beyond ourselves to God to find our commonidentity and worth. It is God who is beyond us to whom we render worship andgive the honour and glory. As God makes humanity in all its culturalexpression, we value, appreciate and enhance all people’s cultures as theyworship their Lord. God is highly honoured when every culture in its ownsetting worships according to its symbols, language and dance and hence wemust enhance everything that was and is and is going to be in creation.

Education
As Dodomarural and urban districts are some of the least developed in the country andthat government secondary schools are very few in the area, in order to beholistic in our ministry, the diocese is engaged in the promotion ofeducation, from kindergarten through to primary and secondary education. We aim at offering the best education that the poorest can also afford. We have primary and secondary schools situated both in rural and urban areas tocater for the needs of all. The ratio of boys and girls is even, although wehave paid special attention for the advancement of girls by buildingdormitories for them. Our schools are Canon Andrea Mwaka Primary andSecondary schools, Holy Trinity and Bishop Stanway Primary Schools, BuigiriSchool for the Blind and Mvumi Secondary School.

Health
Ourservices are both preventive and curative with training institutionsattached to our hospitals. All of our hospitals have community healthdepartments with special emphasis on Mother-Child Health. Although ourhospitals are self-financing, we still need capital help and sometimes someoverhead coverage from our overseas friends so that the hospitals can affordto offer hospital services to the rural poor of the poorest. Whereas Mvumiand Hombolo hospitals cater for the needs of rural people, Mackay HouseHealth Center tries to serve urban people. The government of Tanzaniasupports us by seconding some medical staff and gives bed grants to ourhospitals.

Development
Becauseour region is the least developed in the country, the diocese is heavilyinvolved in development policies and activities at grassroots levels. Ourdevelopment activities are people oriented as against institutionalorientation. We try to empower, help and enhance all people regardless oftheir creed, political affiliations, ethnicity, colour, gender or religion.Our development activities include agriculture, livestock and incomegenerating projects with special care and attention on the environment. Thediocese is also involved in food security programmes, the prevention offamine, famine relief and HIV/AIDS programmes.

We do notmix evangelism with development; instead we aim at being truly professionalin executing development with the people we serve. We are aware of theimportance of religion in development hence we integrate and sensitive topeople’s religions as we try to stand with them in bringing to themsocial-economic transformation.

Our external partners for development include ICCO [Holland], EED [Germany],Bread for the World [Germany], CBM [Germany], World Relief Canada [Canada],and Christian Aid [UK].

Our personnel partners include CMS, CROSSLINKS [UK], CMS AUSTRALIA AND NEWZEALAND, and private individuals.

TheDiocese is self-financing for all of its work except in the developmentdepartment. Its main sources of income in the head office budget includeparish contributions [30%] and income generating projects [70]. Our2002-2003 head office budget is just over 90,000 US$. Although our financesare quite small, it is our policy that what we get is what we use in God’swork. All our health and educational institutions are also self-financing intheir expenditure costs and depend on external help for capital investment.The development departments runs its head office budget from a percentage ofprogramme money that is funded from our overseas partners