Church Politics and the Genocide in Rwanda

bibliographic database
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Periodical article

Title:	Church Politics and the Genocide in Rwanda
Author:	Longman, Timothy P.
Year:	2001
Periodical:	Journal of Religion in Africa
Volume:	31
Issue:	2
Pages:	163-186
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Rwanda
Subjects:	African Independent Churches Tutsi genocide Religion and Witchcraft Ethnic and Race Relations Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Law, Human Rights and Violence
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/1581515
Abstract:	Christian churches were deeply implicated in the 1994 genocide of ethnic Tutsi in Rwanda. Churches were a major site for massacres, and many Christians participated in the slaughter, including church personnel and lay leaders. This article explains that understanding the involvement of Rwanda's churches in the genocide requires looking not simply at the relationship between the churches and the State but at the nature of churches as institutions. Churches had substantial resources and significant influence in the society. They could confer high status on individuals and provide opportunities for a select few to enrich themselves. As a result, the contest to gain power and influence within the churches was often quite intense, and from the beginnings of the Christian mission in Rwanda, these power struggles involved ethnicity as an important factor. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum.