Rwanda: Missions in Rwanda

Missions in Rwanda

Missionaries began coming into Rwanda later than other African countries, they started in the early 1900s during the German colonial period. Catholic missionaries started their first mission in 1900. After that German Lutherans in 1908 had missions all over but left during WW1.[1]

Belgium took over after WW1 and continued with missionary work that the Germans had started. This was protestant missionaries at this point. [2]

1930 a revival began in Gahini (the first Anglican mission), became one of the most important movements of missionary work throughout eastern Africa Protestantism. [3]

1950’s was a large Catholic movement that brought about changes within the government and the abolishment of the monarchy.

“ In the 1950s the Catholic church began actively to support the demands for the end of the unequal relations between Tutsi and Hutu. This contributed significantly to the 1959 revolution, the abolition of the monarchy and of the Tutsi monopoly of power, at the same time as the end of Belgian colonial rule. Anglican revivalists refused to participate in the attacks on the old Tutsi chiefs, and sympathised with a more moderate transfer of power. Many revivalists, both Tutsi and Hutu, were consequently stigmatised as counter-revolutionaries and became refugees. Successive Hutu governments cultivated cordial relations with all the churches, which became identified with the successive ruling regimes of post-independent Rwanda. This alliance tended to blunt the witness of all churches during the genocide of 1994, and render them vulnerable to charges of inciting and participating in the genocide. “[4]

[5] Catholic Church in Rwanda

“In the early 1980s, a very rural and poor village of Rwanda, Kibeho, experienced the apparitions of the Virgin Mary. Today, two shrines are built there and Rwandan Catholics go there today to regret what was to follow in the early 1990s.”[6]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NP622oshTK0

This video shows the shrines and the people that go to worship there. [7]

Rwandan culture has become centralized around Christianity. 60% of the population is Catholic, 30% are Protestants (Pentecostals, Seventh day Adventists, Anglicans, Presbyterians, Free Methodists and Baptists.) [8]

Many Rwandans believe that the Catholic Church helped the Hutus rise and gain power. Many Rwandan Christians continue to participate in the traditional religious practices as well as Christianity. Indigenous healers are also common. [9]