Andrione, Carlo

Born at Arignano in the province of Turin, Italy, on December 20, 1902, Carlo Andrione was accepted in the Consolata Missionary Institute by Joseph Allamano himself, while he was studying theology in the diocesan seminary of Turin. He was ordained a priest on June 21, 1925 and later in the same year he went to Kenya and worked in various missions of Nyeri Diocese. Physically a tall and vigorous man, fluent in Kikuyu, English, and Kiswahili, able to establish good relations with people of all races and moved by a strong determination to establish the Catholic Church in northern Kenya, he founded, in the 1950s, the missions of Baragoi and Maralal, the two missions that would become the seeds of Maralal Diocese, and a chapel at Marsabil, the future centre of Marsabit Diocese. After fifty-three years of missionary work Andrione returned to Italy in 1978 and died there in 1981.

This article, received in 2005, was reprinted with permission from* Christianity among the Nomads: The Catholic Church in Northern Kenya*, by Paul Tablino, © copyright 2004 by St. Paul Communications / Daughters of St. Paul, Nairobi, Kenya.