Blessed Iwene Tansi of Nigeria: The First West African Saint

Blessed Micheal Iwene Tansi was born in 1903 in Aguleri; presently in Anambra East Local Government of Nigeria. He had his early schooling in the mission school in Christian Village (Ugwu Ndi uka) in Aguleri when he was sent to stay with his uncle, Robert Oraekie. It was about that time that he was baptized in 1912 at the age of 9 under the name Michael.

He partly schooled in Holy Trinity School, Onitsha where he began a career in teaching in 1920 and in 1924, he returned to Christian Village, Aguleri where he continued teaching.

He entered seminary in 1925 at Igbariam, also in the present Anambra East Local Government Area and he was ordained a Catholic priest by Bishop C. Heerey in 1937. This was a time were almost all the Catholic priests in Nigeria were foreigners.



As a priest, he served in Nnewi, Dunukofia, Akpu/Ajali and Aguleri his hometown. His desire for a greater devotion to God and life of prayer, he opted for joining monastery in 1950 and he joined the Cistercian Monastery of Mount St. Bernard, England. As a tradition in the monastery, he took vows and took a name too: Cyprain. His full name came to be known as Fr. Cyprain Michael Iwene Tansi.

Fourteen years later, precisely in 1964, he fell sick and died in the monastery on January 20. He died the same day as a result of Arteriosclerosis and rupture and a coronary aneurism.

On 20th January 1986 Archbishop Stephen Ezeanya the new Archbishop of Onitsha inaugurated the Onitsha Archdiocesan Tribunal for the Cause of Fr. Tansi. The request is made for his remains  to be brought back to Nigeria.  The request was granted and on the 12th September 1986 his remains are exhumed and flown to Nigeria on 19th September 1986. After a solemn concelebrated Mass, his remains are reinterred at the Priests' cemetery beside Holy Trinity Cathedral Onitsha on 17th October 1986.

His outstanding monastic life hadn't precedent. He prayers in the monastery were said entirely on pebbles while others prayed with pillows under their knees.

Having been brought back in Onitsha, during a concelebrated high mass, a girl with cancer was cured; thus, giving signal of the holiness of the remains of the priest and monk.

On March 22, 1998, at Onitsha, during a trip to Nigeria made for that very purpose, Pope John Paul II beatified Father Cyprian Michael Tansi, proclaiming him to be a model of priestly zeal and prayer.

That became the second papal visit to Nigeria after that of 1982 where the Holy Father in a homily in the University of Ibadan, told Nigerian intellectuals that the future of Nigeria was their hand to make or mar.

Blessed Tansi's feast day is January 20 every year.