PART ONE: April, 1994  

On the afternoon of 6 April, 1994 I was walking through the parking lot of St.
Joseph’s Cathedral in downtown Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.  A young Tanzanian boy
ran by me shouting, “They’re coming, they’re coming.  Quick.  Go to the front of
the church.”  So in true African community style, without knowing what was going
on, I started running to Sokoine Drive, the highway named after the former Vice
President Edward Sokoine, immediately in front of the cathedral and bordering the
harbor.  “Dar es Salaam,” by the way, is Swahili for “Haven of Peace” because
the waterfront area is a natural harbor of the Indian Ocean – the name being one
of the many ironies connected to this story.

And yes, they were coming!  The presidents of different East and Central African
countries had just finished an important summit meeting hosted by Tanzania to
discuss peace and stability in the region. The motorcades of the presidents
flashed by on their way to Dar es Salaam International Airport where the
respective leaders would board their presidential jets to return to their home
countries.  Of course, we cheered and waved as they sped by hoping to get a
glimpse of who was hidden behind those tinted glass windows.  It was all over in
a minute and then we returned to our normal activities.  I headed back to the
Maryknoll Society House in the Oyster Bay area of Dar es Salaam not far from the
residence of former President Julius Nyerere.

Early the next morning, 7 April, 1994, I innocently drove to the campus of Dar
es Salaam University to meet John Sivalon, a Maryknoll priest who taught
sociology.  We planned to visit several professors on the campus.  John warned
me ahead of time that the parking lot near his office building would be crowded,
but that I would "probably" find an empty space.  As it turned out, the parking
lot was totally empty!  Suddenly I had an eerie feeling. “Strange,” I thought. 
I walked to John’s office with hardly a person around. John himself was
surprised that there were so few people on campus.  He quickly inquired from a
friend down the hall. We both were shocked to learn that Tanzanian President Ali
Hassan Mwinyi, had declared a “National Day of Mourning in Tanzania.”  When the
Presidents of Rwanda and Burundi had flown together from Dar es Salaam back to
Rwanda, their plane had been shot down approaching the capital Kigali and both
leaders killed instantly.  So, no classes at the university.

And the rest is history.  That fateful day, 7 April, 1994 began 100 days of
brutal and unrestrained genocide and violence.  Hutu extremists butchered
800,000 Tutsis, Hutu moderates, and people with mixed ethnic blood.

Again and again and again I have reflected on the many associations to this
particular month of April, 1994.  The British poet T.S. Eliot called April “the
cruelest month” because it is popularly known as the month that Jesus Christ
died.  During this very month African bishops of the Catholic Church were
meeting in the historic 1994 First African Synod in Rome to discuss topics such
as the “Church as Family” in Africa.  At the end of April, 1994 Nelson Mandela
was preparing in 10 days time to be sworn in as the first black president of
South Africa.  How could so many momentous events happen in Africa at the very
same time?  Ironies abound.

PART TWO: October, 1994 

In October, 1994 I joined another Maryknoll priest to travel to Rulenge Diocese
in Western Tanzania to study ways that Maryknoll Missionaries could help in the
refugee camps.  We called our trip a “Journey into the Heart of God’s Suffering
People.”  Solemnly I stood on Rusumo Bridge that connects Rwanda and Tanzania. 
After the Tutsi-dominated army took over Rwanda, 300,000 desperate Hutu refugees
fled the persecution and crossed this bridge into Tanzania in a single day. 
Visiting the nearby Benaco Refugee Camp I wrote the following prose poem called:

They Came Walking, Walking

They came walking,
walking.

They came walking,
walking up the long, steep hill.

They came trudging,
trudging.

They came trudging,
trudging up the long, steep hill.

Loaded down with
bundles of firewood on their heads

They came walking,
walking.

Women, plenty of
women, men, girls, boys

A long line of
bewildered children.

An endless stream
of weary humanity.

5   10   20   40 
 80   160   320…

And still they
came.

They came walking,
walking.

Then the pouring
rain came.

In torrents, in
sheets — a cold, biting rain.

Still they came
walking up the long, steep hill.

Balancing bundles
of branches and heavy logs on their heads

Occasionally being
blown across the wind-swept road.

They came walking,
walking.

We watched warm and
dry

Inside our Toyota
pick-up truck.

Peering out of
rain-splashed windows.

Whipped by the
wind, Hutu refugees slowly staggered by with tired and pained faces.

Wet bits of
clothing clinging to frail bodies

They came walking,
walking.

We drove slowly for
three kilometers down the long, steep hill.

During the biggest
downpour

Forced to pull off
the road and park.

After the heavy
rain stopped

We drove slowly
back up the long, steep hill.

They came walking,
walking.

Some sat exhausted
with their firewood by the side of the road.

Drenched and
shivering.

Large tree limbs
and logs left abandoned.

Others trudged
ahead in a wet daze.

Still others reeled
from fatigue.

They came walking,
walking.

It was the road by
the Benaco Refugee Camp.

Northwestern
Tanzania.

Late October, 1994.

Overnight the
second largest city in Tanzania.

Now 400,000 wet,
shivering Hutu refugees from Rwanda.

GENOCIDAL WAR IS
HELL!

PART THREE: April, 2004 

Let us move ahead 10 years in time. 7 April, 2004 and once again by a strange
coincidence I am on the compound of St. Joseph’s Cathedral in downtown Dar es
Salaam.  Suddenly the church bells peal the 12 Noon Prayer.  Stunned for a
moment, I suddenly remember and turn to my Tanzanian companion and say, “Let’s
observe one minute of silence.” Then we prayed together for Rwanda.  The United
Nations had designated 7April, 2004 as ”International Day of Reflection” for
Rwanda, and the African country had asked other nations to hold memorial
silences to commemorate the 10^th anniversary of the terrible
genocide. But apart from official ceremonies at United Nations offices, in major
U.N. centres such as Nairobi and Geneva and at Rwandan embassies worldwide,
there was no sign that the gesture was widely observed.  How many people really
observed one minute of silence on that day?  Did you?

PART FOUR: April, 2007

Let us move ahead three years in time until today, Sunday, 15 April, 2007. Yes,
April again. As William Shakespeare wrote: "The wheel has come full circle." But
April doesn’t have to be the cruelest month. It can be the kindest, gentlest
month.  It depends on us – you and me.  Peace and justice and forgiveness and
mercy and reconciliation can flow like a river throughout Rwanda, East Africa,
the Horn of Africa, the continent of Africa, the whole world. We just have
imitate the Rwandan woman in the following true story that I collected after the
genocide called:

The Merciful Rwandan Wife

In a particular section of Kigali, Rwanda, where people from the Hutu and Tutsi
ethnic groups lived together, genocidal war broke out with a bloody vengeance.
Neighbors attacked neighbors. In one area, a Hutu man murdered his Tutsi
neighbor. Some time later, after the Rwandan Patriotic Front had won the war and
taken over the government, local investigations of the atrocities started. The
wife of the dead Tutsi man was asked to identify her husband’s murderer. She
refused, knowing that the Hutu man would be arrested, imprisoned, and probably
killed. The woman preferred to remain silent to save another life.

“This is enough”, she said. "The killing has to stop somewhere. One murder does
not justify another killing. We have to break this cycle of violence and end
this genocide.”

           
So she chose to forgive.