Liberia: Bishop Merchant Returns to Lead Planned LoBoNi Diocese

Published: September 9, 2026

MONROVIA – The Episcopal Church of Liberia plans to split into three dioceses within four years, ending more than 150 years as a single national diocese, and the bishop assigned to lead the first has returned home to do it from Bolahun.

Suffragan Bishop Wilmot T. Merchant II, a Liberian-born priest who spent much of his career in the United States, was recently elected and consecrated to lead the LoBoNi Archdeaconry, covering Lofa, Bong and Nimba counties. He will be based at Holy Cross Mission in Bolahun, Lofa County, and will be formally welcomed at a thanksgiving service at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church there on Oct. 4.

“The hope is that within four years, Liberia will have three dioceses instead of the one diocese that has existed for more than 175 years,” Merchant said.

The plan would create LoBoNi in the north-central region, a southeastern diocese and the existing national structure, an arrangement resembling the Roman Catholic Church’s in Liberia. The Right Rev. Michael T. Sie has been assigned to the southeast, covering Grand Gedeh, Maryland, Sinoe and River Gee counties. “We are not there yet,” Merchant said. “We are in the process of creating the other two.”

Distance drove the decision. Travel between Monrovia and the interior becomes difficult in the rainy season, and Merchant said the church has considered decentralization for years.

He starts from a thin base. Lofa has nine churches and preaching stations, Bong five and Nimba four. The church wants each archdeaconry to have at least five congregations capable of supporting themselves within five years. “At this time, I do not have one,” Merchant said.

That makes the job organizational as much as pastoral, requiring fundraising and a change in how members see their obligation to the institution. “Nobody is coming to rescue you from your situation,” he said. “You have to figure out what we do in our context to be self-supporting.”

Merchant said he will look beyond Episcopalians to Liberians educated in church schools, a group that includes many prominent citizens. “If you have benefited from Episcopal education and Episcopal institutions, then we will welcome your support,” he said.

The Bolahun area has a long history of interaction between Christian institutions and traditional communities, and Merchant said the church must distinguish between practices that can coexist with the Gospel and those that cannot. He said religious difference should not stop the church from serving anyone. “If I see someone as created in the image and likeness of God, then I want to do what is in that person’s best interest and not allow religion to divide us,” he said. “You are my brother, she is my sister, and we together serve humanity as best as we can, to the honor and glory of God.”