Rwanda Before the Genocide: Catholic Politics and Ethnic Discourse in the Late Colonial Era

ISBN-13: 9780190612375 / Angielski / Miękka / 2016 / 360 str.

J. J. Carney

Opis

Winner of the Bethwell A. Ogot Book Prize of the African Studies Association

Between 1920 and 1994, the Catholic Church was Rwanda's most dominant social and religious institution. In recent years, the church has been critiqued for its perceived complicity in the ethnic discourse and political corruption that culminated with the 1994 genocide. In analyzing the contested legacy of Catholicism in Rwanda, Rwanda Before the Genocide focuses on a critical decade, from 1952 to 1962, when Hutu and Tutsi identities became politicized, essentialized, and associated with political violence.

This study--the first English-language church history on Rwanda in over 30 years--examines the reactions of Catholic leaders such as the Swiss White Father Andre Perraudin and Aloys Bigirumwami, Rwanda's first indigenous bishop. It evaluates Catholic leaders' controversial responses to ethnic violence during the revolutionary changes of 1959-62 and after Rwanda's ethnic massacres in 1963-64, 1973, and the early 1990s. In seeking to provide deeper insight into the many-threaded roots of the Rwandan genocide, Rwanda Before the Genocide offers constructive lessons for Christian ecclesiology and social ethics in Africa and beyond.

Recenzje

I greatly appreciate Carney's research on the recent history of the Catholic Church in Rwanda. It is not easy to write about controversial historical periods. Carney has succeeded in overcoming the dangers of the task by basing his analysis on recent, unused, and primary sources. The result is a well-documented book with new insights on a crisis whose impacts are still real."-Paul Rutayisire, Director, Center for Conflict Management, National University of Rwanda

O autorze

J.J. Carney is Assistant Professor of Theology at Creighton University. His research and teaching interests engage the theological and historical dimensions of the Catholic experience in modern Africa. He has published articles in African Ecclesial Review, Modern Theology, Journal of Religion in Africa, and Studies in World Christianity.