The Church: Genocide or Justice

In the 1990s, the Rwandan and the Burundian churches, Protestant and Catholic, chose genocide.  Tutsi and Hutu Christians killed each other on a massive scale---hundreds of thousands.  In both countries, around 70 percent of the populations profess to be Christian.  Pastors and priests killed parishinors; teachers killed students.

When churches neglect justice and the love of God (Luke 11:42), unchecked ethnocentrism and oppression can run wild. Why did Rwandan and Burundian pastors and priests ignore the extensive biblical teaching on ethnocentrism, oppression, justice, reconciliation and the kingdom of God as Jubilee justice?  Why did they ignore the vast prophetic teachings on oppression and justice?

While he doesn't address ethnocentrism and oppression from a biblical perspective, Tracy Kidder in his excellent but profoundly disturbing book, Strength In What Remains, does write about genocide as he presents the unbelievably tragic life story of Deo, a Burundian Tutsi.  The following are excerpts from Kidder's book:

The Hutu and Tutsi shared the same language, culture and religion; "They intermarried, too---more commonly after colonialism, at least in Rwanda. . . .  it was hard to tell Hutu and Tutsi apart simply by looks."

But there were class distinctions; " . . . aristocracy was drawn from the population of cow-owning Tutsi's and their inferiors or dependents were predominately Hutu farmers."

". . . the effects of colonization were profound. . . ."

"Colonialism introduced new levels of violence and tools [guns] for violence."  Europeans didn't invent the terms Hutu and Tutsi, but they "added poison to that terminology."  "Europeans made the [Tutsi and Hutu] distinctions into a racial difference [Tutsis became a white race in a black skin]."

Hutus were treated as "virtual slaves"; Europeans created worse poverty and "periodic famines." This created "great resentment among Hutus."

"Rwandan economy and government entirely interwoven with foreign aid and dependent on it.  The administration of that aid was a vehicle 'for exclusion and for the reproduction of privileges for a small elite."

" . . .structural violence [systems of oppression] was an essential element in the acute violence [genocide] that overwhelmed Rwanda in 1994."

My conclusion:  ethnocentrism and oppressive economic systems always generate violence---sometimes extreme violence or genocide.

Unfortunately, genocide or something similar has been a common feature of the colonial era; here are three other examples:

1.  West Africa:  Europeans combined God, greed and slaves.  They built churches o top of slave castles where slaves were stored waiting for slave ships.  For me, the combination of the slave trade and slavery are another type of genocide.

2.  Caribbean Islands:  Columbus and his followers combined God, greed, gold and genocide.  The result: TOTAL genocide; in the islands, there are no Native American peoples/cultures left.

3.  Puritan colonists:  They combined God, greed, land and genocide; this set the pattern for the rest of American history.  Few culturally functioning tribes left east of the Mississippi.

Even today, there is little biblical teaching on ethnocentrism and oppression, justice and reconciliation.  Among American churches, there is little repentance, restitution and repair.  There must be a conspiracy to avoid these important biblical teachings in order to protect white supremacy/superiority and white privilege.

According to Luke 4, Jesus confronted the two major social evils of his time in one sermon: sermon A on oppression, 4:18-19 and sermon B on ethnocentrism, 4:25-30.  Sermon B almost got him killed on the spot..  In my 89 years, I have never heard any white American pastor preach sermons A and B.