wfn.org | 'Reconstructing hearts' in Rwanda

[FRANK_IMHOFF.parti@ecunet.org (FRANK IMHOFF)]

FEATURE

Despite global conventions against genocide and the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights, the international community did little to prevent one of
the century's worst genocides in Rwanda in 1994. Now, after four years of
after shocks, Rwanda's citizens still suffer incalculable social and
psychological consequences. Staffed largely by Rwandans, a Lutheran World
Federation program there has so far withstood severe tests. Now the fate of
years of relief and rehabilitation work is tied increasingly to a new
partnership with pastors and the church.

NEW YORK, 9 July 1998 (lwi) - Pastor John is the kind of person the killers
were looking for that night last March (see LWI 6 for 26 March, p. 3). Of
Tutsi origin, he grew up in a family who had fled to Tanzania and is now
settled back in Rwanda.

When killers struck at a Lutheran World Federation (LWF) community site, he
and others came to comfort and to take a deeper look at what had happened
and why. "We are here to reconstruct hearts," says Pastor John
Rutsindintwarane, leader of the newly formed Lutheran Church in Rwanda. As
such, he and his LWF co-workers may be symbols of a new Rwanda.

To the human mind, the old Rwanda is the grimmest of lessons in the failure
of politics and the horror of civil war. To the heart, it is an even deeper
tragedy, a catastrophe of the human spirit. In a century of several
holocausts, who can say how once again so many lives were shattered?

For Lutherans, the question might best be understood with the carpenters,
truck drivers, social workers and, now, two pastors who assist the LWF in
Rwanda. All are being asked to stay on the job despite the violence that
still ripples across parts of their country. The LWF is determined to stay
-- especially at the site attacked in March -- despite a drop in financial
support for its work there. "We are making an extra commitment there even
if we haven't got a cent," says LWF country representative, Jaap Aantjes.
"Its the last place we'd leave."

That "last place" is Bukora in Rwanda's relatively quiet southeast. There,
on a former ranch, people driven from Rwanda during 40 years of strife are
starting life again. Like Pastor John they are the living tally of Rwanda's
turmoil: Tutsis who fled massacres as long ago as the 1960s and Hutus
driven out in 1994. In today's Rwanda the two groups of refugees are called
Old Caseload and New Caseload, respectively. Under the new government,
"Tutsi" and "Hutu" are labels no longer allowed.

While violence has often stymied resettlement and reconstruction efforts
elsewhere in the country, the Bukora area has been calm. The LWF has solid
standing here, thanks to decades of work in neighboring Tanzania and a key
role in the recent, massive repatriation. The Old Caseload, when they
became refugees in the 1960s, settled in Tanzania and Uganda with LWF
assistance. Then, in 1994, the New Caseload found refuge in huge border
camps which the LWF helped supply. These millions who left are now trying
to settle-in back home.

The Bukora project has done well. New homes, schools, clinics, roads and
garden plots transformed ranch land into a vision of Rwanda finally on the
mend. Troubles to the west and north seemed far off -- where the militia of
1994 still operate almost daily, where the army carries out reprisals and
pre-emptive strikes, where 1994's guilty kill 1994's witnesses and vice
versa.

Far off, that is, until the events of March 11, 1998. At nine o'clock that
night staff were socializing after supper at the office. Armed men
approached silently in the dark, then shouted that they had come to kill
Tutsis. They called for certain staff members by name. In the ensuing melee
three died: Rubayita Donath, a tractor driver; Karimba Johnson, a truck
driver; and Ngaramba Innocent, a carpenter. Rwamuhabwa Paul, another
tractor driver, was seriously wounded.

The 30 attackers next turned their guns, machetes and hoes on the
resettlement community itself. They selected Old Caseload residents, killed
five people and wounded two.

Casualties could have been worse. It had rained heavily that day, stopping
several LWF staffers who had planned to be at Bukora for the night. The
killings could have shattered the community along Rwanda's old fault lines.
Where violence has been ethnicized, all people from the victims' ethnic
group fear further attacks; all those from the killers' ethnic group become
instant suspects. Some residents fled. Others cowered. Work on the
settlement stopped. Fragile hopes for a common future in Bukora were
shaken. But were they dashed?

Bukora was civilians facing men in arms, but it was also a community afraid
of something else -- that, just as violence had forced other aid groups to
leave other places, the LWF would now leave Bukora.

The answer was not long in coming. "We are determined to stay with the
communities," Aantjes said within days of the murders. "Our success is
directly related to staff being present on the ground."

The Rwandan army went on alert in the area. Resettlement work gradually
resumed. But defense of a different kind was mobilized as well -- renewed
efforts to ensure that traumatized citizens might live together side by
side. Amid the tools, tractors, houses and plans of the LWF community
program, small groups would meet to discuss a different development agenda:
fear and forgiveness, new life and hope.

"We found them afraid," says Rev. Peter Munyeshili, a Pentecostal clergyman
who works with Pastor John. "We tried to gather them, to talk over the
incident. We gave them the Word of God and promised to come back."

The Word that Pastor Peter gives includes John 10:10, the verse about Jesus
coming so that people might "have life in all its fullness." Killers come
like thieves to destroy that life, he tells his listeners. Rwandans are
ready to believe in the miracle of life, he says. Why? Because, amid
horrors, some saw miracles happen in 1994. In fact, just to have survived
is a miracle for many, he says.

"Reconstruction of people's hearts," says Pastor John, "is essential
back-up for the reconstruction work that is visible to the eye -- where LWF
already plays a big role." He credits Aantjes and the LWF for grasping the
connection between the seen and the unseen, and for a ready commitment to
pastoral work, especially since the March attack.

But making hearts new is a far slower process, he hastens to add, than
rebuilding a war-ravaged country. The events of 1994 constrict his pastoral
work today. It is as if people's motives then still conspire to keep their
consciences prisoner now.

On the one hand, many were forced to kill their neighbors in order to save
themselves or their loved ones. Others knew what was going on but did not
or could not resist. Extremist propaganda prepared the whole nation for the
unthinkable and then solid planning gave the horrors a life of their own.
Also, almost everyone -- from guiltiest to most innocent -- has suffered
since in crowded refugee camps, while internally displaced or under the new
regime's severe measures to maintain security.

On the other hand, some killed or simply took advantage of massacres and
civil war in order to gain land and property.

Guilt still seems to prevail against contrition and forgiveness. Classic
confessions do happen but are relatively rare, according to Pastor John.
Once, in a refugee camp, some young men were chopping wood. One with axe in
hand confessed to the others that in 1994 he had been forced to kill eight
people. "Will God ever forgive me?" he asked his fellows. Pastor John came
over to him and said, "Yes, God does forgive us. You are forgiven." The
young man was deeply touched.

But there is still no magic moment for many. What of the dreaded
interahamwe militia, for example? Has anyone forgiven them? "Yes," Pastor
John says readily, "I know two people who have. One is a woman whom the
militia wounded. 'I forgive them even if they did it because I want to die
as a Christian,' she told me." Even in the bid for heaven's absolution her
earthly rationale prevailed.

Pastor John and other church leaders in the Kibungo region around Bukora
preach love and consolation. As part of the LWF's work he also holds
monthly community meetings. Participants were reserved at first, he says,
but now more and more are warming to the subject. In a country where they
see few hints of compromise either from those associated with the 1994
massacres or from hard-liners in the current, minority-led government, they
know how many hearts must change. They ask that community forums be started
in other troubled places.

Pastor John has few illusions about what Rwanda requires and yet much
faith. "Some hearts on both sides are eager to listen and learn. That was
true in Benaco (the huge 1994-era camp in Tanzania) and true here," he
says. "This thing needs people who speak from the heart. It will take time
for hearts to change, but if we are committed, it is possible. With God
nothing is impossible."

Such grassroots diplomacy for peace does not take place in a vacuum. It
stands beside the LWF's "social program" which aims to build community
spirit with local churches through sports teams, church choirs, theater
groups and the care of vulnerable people. There is also the shelter and
infrastructure work mentioned above and, finally, economic programs that
encourage local small-business cooperatives.

All programs are intended to meet basic needs while breaking down barriers
that can cripple mixed communities. Alice Mukayirangu, an LWF worker at
Bukora, sees progress. "Bukora was very bushy and had no food when the
people came," she says. "Now they are getting crops from seed they have
planted. The residents are not hungry anymore. By next year they will not
need any more relief aid." Aantjes agrees. "The people here realize that
they share common needs with former enemies," he says.

Yet even as more is asked of staff, such programs are increasingly squeezed
for funds. LWF member churches are giving less and less for the agency's
work in Rwanda.

Alice was targeted by the raiders in March, but she and other LWF workers
say they are not afraid. The army has stepped up patrols in the area and
the raid is under investigation. However, safety also has a deeper, social
foundation. As community programs succeed, the LWF is betting that
residents and staff will become safer. Security is basically a community
responsibility, say LWF officials in Kigali and at LWF headquarters in
Geneva. Thus, whenever possible, staff will keep living in the communities
they serve, helping guarantee security with their neighbors. Meanwhile,
since the attack, the LWF takes daily operational precautions and keeps in
close contact with civil authorities.

Security is spiritual as well. In a country where genocide divided the
church as deeply as it divided society, Pastor John puts himself squarely
on the moral front lines. "A shepherd cannot betray his sheep," he says.
"As a pastor, I am anointed to serve and I must stand for peace. Our
message of assurance is based in hope. Our commitment to peace goes with
action." His words embrace the wounded body of Christ. Lived out, these
words will bear witness to a new Rwanda and to a new Rwandan church as
well.

(This article was written by Jonathan Frerichs, director for communication
of Lutheran World Relief, New York.)

*       *       *
Lutheran World Information
Editorial Assistant: Janet Bond-Nash
E-mail: jbn@lutheranworld.org
http://www.lutheranworld.org/