Church of the Province of Rwanda

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The Church of the Province of Rwanda is a province of the Anglican Communion, covering 9 sees in East Africa. The current primate of the province is Archbishop Emmanuel Musaba Kolini.

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[edit] Official names

Church of the Province of Rwanda is also known as Province de L'Eglise Anglicane au Rwanda. The former name of the province, L'Eglise Episcopal au Rwanda was changed by action of an extraordinary meeting of the Provincial Synod at St Etienne Biryogo on 27 November 2007.[1]

[edit] History

The Church of the Province of Rwanda traces its roots to two missionary doctors of the British Church Missionary Society. Arthur Stanely Smith and Leonard Sharp began a mission movement in Rwanda during the first two years of World War I. In 1926, Halord Guillebaud baptised the first converts at Gahini.

In 1992, the Province of the Episcopal church of Rwanda (PEER) was formed consisting of four dioceses, Kigali, Butare, Shyira and Byumba with the first Archbishop being Augustin Nshamihigo. In 1998, the current Archbishop Emmanuel Kolini was enthroned.

At start of the Rwandan Genocide in 1994, Archbishop Nshamihigo and Bishop Jonathan Ruhumuliza acted as spokespersons for the government in a news conference, blaming the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front for the genocide. The war left the church and the nation in ruins. Since peace has returned, the Church has embarked on a program of spiritual healing for thousands of traumatised people.

[edit] Membership

Today, there are over one million Anglicans out of an estimated population of 8.7 million.

[edit] Structure

The polity of the Church of the Province of Rwanda is Episcopalian church governance, which is the same as other Anglican churches. The church maintains a system of geographical parishes organized into dioceses. There are 9 of these, each headed by a bishop.

The Province of Rwanda also offers oversight to the Anglican Mission in the Americas and has ordained 8 missionary Bishops in America the most recent in 2007. The Anglican Mission in the Americas grew out of a response to the crisis in faith in North America that occurred after the ordination of openly gay priest Gene Robinson as a Bishop. In many ways, Rwanda was moved to respond to America because of the pain suffered in the genocide. Archbishop Kolini notes that he could not turn his back on a faithful people who cried out for his help: “When UN Troops were asked to help Rwanda at the time of the genocide, instead of helping, the world abandoned us. I will never do what the world has done to my people.”

http://www.theamia.org/eastafricaconnection/home


Genocide victims in Murambi Technical School. Estimates put the death toll as high as one million. The Church is still recovering.

[edit] Worship and liturgy

The Church of the Province of Rwanda embraces three orders of ministry: deacon, priest, and bishop. A local variant of the Book of Common Prayer is used.

[edit] Doctrine and practice

See also: Anglicanism and Anglican doctrine

The center of the Church of the Province of Rwanda's teaching is the life and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The basic teachings of the church, or catechism, includes:

The threefold sources of authority in Anglicanism are scripture, tradition, and reason. These three sources uphold and critique each other in a dynamic way. This balance of scripture, tradition and reason is traced to the work of Richard Hooker, a sixteenth century apologist. In Hooker's model, scripture is the primary means of arriving at doctrine and things stated plainly in scripture are accepted as true. Issues that are ambiguous are determined by tradition, which is checked by reason.[1]

[edit] Ecumenical relations

Unlike many other Anglican churches, the Church of the Province of Rwanda is not a member of the ecumenical World Council of Churches.[2]

[edit] References

  1. ^ Anglican Listening Detail on how scripture, tradition, and reason work to "uphold and critique each other in a dynamic way".
  2. ^ http://www.oikoumene.org/?id=3587 World Council of Churches

[edit] Kigali Anglican Theological College (KATC)

Kigali Anglican Theological College (KATC) started in February 2006 as a response to the training needs of the Anglican Church of Rwanda in post Genocide Rwanda and is staffed by pastors from several dioceses in Rwanda as well as mission partners from the UK.

In short, the vision of the college is to: ‘Prepare God’s people for the work of service’ (Ephesians 4:12). The college strives to provide quality Christian training to the next generation of Christian leaders for Rwanda and, in turn, to assist in the development of the whole country.

The School of Theology was the first to open in the custom-built buildings situated in an area of new development not far from the capital city, Kigali. A Language School was opened in 2006 to meet the language needs of Francophone students needing to study in English. This school is also open to the wider public and plans are underway to develop a private income-generating language school in the city of Kigali.

At the time of writing (2008), there are 37 students studying in both the School of Theology and the Language School. Plans to further develop the college and to become accredited as a university are underway.

More information: http://www.rwandachristianuniversity.org/

[edit] Further reading

  • Anglicanism, Neill, Stephen. Harmondsworth, 1965.

[edit] External links

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