By Gaston Rwaka.

Bishop Canisius Karagire from Living Word Ministries, says that during the post genocide era, Rwanda deserves peace and restoration to deliver the nation from the bad historical background.

In saying this, he referred to the concept of The East African Revival which is the movement of renewal in the Church in East Africa during the late 1920s and 1930s. It began on a hill called Gahini in the then-Belgian Rwanda-Urundi in 1929, then spreading to the eastern mountains of Belgian Congo, Uganda Protectorate (British Uganda), Tanganyika Territory and Kenya Colony during the 1930s and 1940s.

The revival reshaped the Anglican Church already present in East Africa and contributed to its significant growth from the 1940s into the 1970s.

Speaking to Pressbox, Bishop Canisius showed that Rwanda is the source of Christian revival in East Africa but during the genocide against the Tutsi the church was asleep.

He said that the men/women of God are going to waken the church with revival that was asleep, even if people wrote East African Revival as post-genocide in Rwanda.

He said again that now Rwanda needs the outreach crusades and to bring back the revival in the East Africa region because the revival is the legacy of Africans, especially Rwandans.

He added: “We are among the pioneers of revival into the church after the Genocide, being the reason why we would like to request all the churches to unite and make the reconciliation of our country without limitation of religious beliefs but to be focused in Christ Jesus”.

In his speech, Bishop Karagire evoked transformation as key. “Revival means salvation and revival means transformation,” he said.

In his conclusion he explained how the real Christians were chosen to bring back the East African revival because if we were not chosen, we would have been destroyed.