Rwanda is a dictatorship that allows for no dissent from official narratives. This month, “the Rwanda Governance Board (RGB) and other government agencies have closed over 5,600 places of worship, including 100 cave churches over failing to meet the legal requirements governing faith-based organizations (FBOs) in Rwanda.”1 What are these legal requirements? They include many items that we might call building codes, but most importantly: “a statement of faith that “does not contradict national values and standards, or the unity of Rwandans.” This “national values and standards” is the real reason for the shutdowns in my opinion. The government seeks to control all aspects of society, and the governing party, the RPF, monitors everyone down to the household level. This is just another extension of control, a control which also infects the Anglican Church in Rwanda.
Rwanda’s Anglican Archbishop and the current head of GAFCON, Laurent Mbanda, is a longtime defender of this evil regime as I have chronicled many times.2 It is therefore no surprise to see him backing up this wicked intervention by the government:
Mbanda also called on faith-based organizations to view the closure of non-compliant churches as a beneficial operation, highlighting the importance of clean, well-ventilated spaces for worship.
It is far past time for Anglicans in other parts of the world to call out this kind of compromise, particularly in a national church that seeks to influence the ACNA.
- https://www.newtimes.co.rw/article/18980/news/religion/interfaith-council-leader-says-churches-knew-what-to-do ↩︎
- For example https://alivingtext.com/mbanda-interview/, https://alivingtext.com/laurent-mbanda-praises-paul-kagame-at-gafcon/, and https://alivingtext.com/reviewing-laurent-mbandas-book-committed-to-conflict/. ↩︎
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