When Father Jim Roy and I visited the refugee camps in
Rulenge Diocese, Northwestern Tanzania in October, 1994 we called our trip a
“Journey Into the Heart of God’s Suffering People.” Again and again we were
struck by the fact that the Rwandan refugees are predominantly Christians. 
Following the national statistics, 70 % of the refugees could be Catholic.  So
this genocidal civil war has been Christians killing Christians, Catholics
butchering Catholics. The magnitude of the tragedy is staggering:  As many as
one millions Rwandese died during the civil war.  Behind the ethnic and tribal
clashes is the problem of power.  This means forcefully controlling a country or
a section of country where the land is too little for the growing Rwandan
population.  The classic African proverb can be rewritten: When elephants
(political leaders) fight the grass (little people carrying firewood in the
refugee camps) get hurt.  

    How could this happen?  One view is that in the past
century Rwanda was “Christianized (superficially provided the sacraments) but
not evangelized (in depth).”   A Nigerian Catholic bishop sadly stated:  "In
Rwanda the blood of tribalism is thicker than the water of Baptism."  During our
visit to Rulenge we heard the stark statement: "If Christianity cannot reconcile
the Hutus and the Tutsis then Christianity has failed."  It was emphasized that
the four essential steps in peace process are: admission of guilt; healing;
reconciliation; and peacemaking.  If the church is really a family then we have
a deep responsibility to reach out to our suffering Rwandan sisters and
brothers.  Jesus speaks directly to all of us today in the contextualized words
of Matthew 25:34-40: "I was in a refugee camp and you cared for me.  I was
traumatized by war and you ministered to me."