Arrival in Kigali

I arrived in Kigali on Monday afternoon after a furious 48 hours of flying and one night in Addis Ababa. My arrival in Kigali was pleasant and I was greeted by the son of the Bishop of the Lutheran Church of Rwanda. After spending Monday and Tuesday trying to acclimate to the time change and get adjusted to my new environment I am beginning the process for which I came. On Wednesday and Thursday I spent all my time with my mentor trying to receive government permission to conduct my research. I knew this going into the process, but what we all learned was that we need to receive permission from each government office that oversees the different arenas in which we want to conduct research. For example, I want to interview religious leaders about reconciliation, which means I need to receive permission from the National Unity and Reconciliation Commission. I will also be looking for permission for research from TIG, which oversees reintegration programs for those convicted in the gacaca process and will be considering seeking permission from the leaders of gacaca to view a proceeding and to interview pastors on the gacaca court panels. For those of you who do not know, the Gacaca courts are a modern interpretation of an old tradition in Rwandan justice. Theoretically, Rwandans traditionally meted out justice by assembling the aggrieved and accused parties and discussing the matter with the elders of the community. This process has been formalized today, where each community elects its own gacaca panels based on their standing in the community and their perceived integrity.

As they say, all the best battle plans go out the window as soon as the first shots are fired. This has been the case for my research here as well. While I thought the Lutheran Church of Rwanda was currently engaged in reconciliation programs outside their religious teachings and preaching in the pulpit, I found this was not the case. What was indicated on their website was in fact their aspirations and not their reality. For research purposes this will force me to change my methods and the focus of my research slightly, but for my consultancy, this will provide me with an interesting opportunity to work with the church leadership to formally plan and structure what a reconciliation and peacebuilding would look like within the higher administration of the LCR.

As I am awaiting government approval to begin the bulk of my research, I have been involved in many interesting preliminary conversations with my mentor and the Bishop of the church. One of the most interesting developments I have discovered is the changing face of Christianity in Rwanda. Before the genocide in 1994, the country was overwhelmingly Catholic, roughly 90%. After the genocide, there was a backlash against the Catholic Church specifically and Christianity generally. In the 15 years since the genocide Rwanda is again amongst the most religious, and specifically Christian, nations in Africa. However, the Christian face of Rwanda has changed in that time. The Catholic Church still dominates the religious landscape, but Pentecostal and traditional Protestant churches are increasing their numbers regularly. Pentecostal churches were the first to gain prominence in Rwanda after 1994 and continue to be the second most visible church body in the country. Members of Pentecostal churches are largely young people who have been disenchanted with the Catholic Church, or who are drawn to the sense of community found in Pentecostal churches. The worship style offered by these churches is attractive to young people, akin to the growing numbers of young people in America attending community churches that offer entertaining worship styles, contemporary songs, and dancing. From the conversations I am having with my mentor at the Lutheran Church of Rwanda, after young people in the Pentecostal church begin to want to settle down, get married, and raise a family, they begin to gravitate toward more traditional Protestant churches, including the Lutheran church. Membership in the Lutheran church is growing throughout the country, in part due to this phenomenon. It is an interesting cycle where church memberships keep changing throughout the country.

I am interested to explore the implications of these changing demographics on social reconciliation. It is clear that Catholic, Pentecostal, and traditional Protestant churches are all competing with each other for members, but they are engaging in reconciliation projects that cross denominational and religious boundaries. The feeling, I gather, is that when it comes to membership, each church wants to promote its own interests, but when it comes to reconciliation, individual interests in each church fade away and the overarching national interest of reconciliation predominates. Different denominations tend to approach reconciliation through different means, but they try to work together or compliment each other when they can. I will be pursuing this issue in more depth going forward.