After the 1994 genocide, which killed an estimated 800,000 people, mostly members of the Tutsi ethnic group and some moderate Hutus, the country’s churches were widely accused of complicity in the violence. Some of the churches were sites of massacre where fleeing civilians had sought refuge. Priests and pastors faced accusations of killing or aiding the murders.
Later, some of the clerics faced charges of crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in the city of Arusha, in neighboring Tanzania.
Paul Kagame, now Rwanda’s president, and then the general hailed for stopping the killings, has frequently raised concerns over the proliferation of churches.
In August last year, Kagame threatened to arrest Catholic pilgrims visiting sites in the country, accusing them of worshipping poverty. He voiced a concern that many young people were spending more time praying at prayer sites than working to end their impoverishment.
“No one must worship poverty. Do not ever do that again…If I ever hear about this again, that people traveled to go and worship poverty, I will bring trucks and round them up and imprison them, and only release them when the poverty mentality has left them,” Kagame, a Catholic, was quoted in the press as saying recently.
Some critics fear the government is infringing on people’s freedom of worship, but clerics and officials say it is about the safety and protection of worshippers.
“Rwanda has freedom of worship,” said Mbanda. “I think we are starting churches where they should not be. Sometimes we are having church structures that a god cannot live in, let alone a person.”
The archbishop also highlighted the rise of unlicensed preachers, cautioning that some were taking their followers to dangerous caves, rivers and forests for prayers and retreats.
At the same time, Rwanda’s approach to regulating religious groups is influencing action across the East African region.
In Kenya, a task force formed to investigate the recent Shakahola starvation massacre in the coastal region has recommended the formation of a Religious Affairs Commission, renewed registration of all religious organizations and the establishment of educational standards for religious leaders, among other actions.
This article originally appeared here.
