In 1963 a movement of dissatisfied Roman Catholics in south Nyanza Province left the Diocese of Kisii and formed the Legio Maria Church, or Legion of Mary Church, under the leadership of the Lodvikus-son of God Simeo Melkio Ondetto and an old mystic woman named Mama Maria. This mystic woman is the one Legio Maria adherents relate with the Fátima Secrets. She is believed to have called a number of Catholics to the new movement by visionary appearances, telling them to look forward to her son who had come to Africa. Her spiritual son, Simeo Ondetto, was then a catechist in Roman Catholic Church. Ondetto was excommunicated by the Catholic Church in the 1960s. By 1980 the church numbered 248,000 adherents. Government estimates at the time of the split from the Catholic Church stated that there were nearly 90,000 followers of Legio Maria. By 1968, it had become a member of the East African United Churches.