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The church altar in Nyamata shows the blood stains where hundreds were massacred. Photo by NBC's Paul Nassar.
From the outside, it looks just like the countless other churches we drove past on our way from Kigali: A simple brick structure, with a corrugated tin roof. This modest building, however, is no longer a place of worship- it has instead become a memorial for the victims of humanity’s worst crime: Genocide.
The church in Nyamata is just over an hour away from the bustle of the Rwandan capital. Its interior is bare. Empty wooden pews line either side of the aisle leading up to the altar. This is the site where hundreds of Rwandans fled during the massacres that gripped this nation between April and July 1994. They huddled in the building, hoping that as a place of worship, they would somehow be shielded from the atrocities outside. They were wrong.
The killers easily breached the meager defenses and began lobbing grenades and firing randomly at the crowd inside. Hundreds died in this one location and the crimes committed here have left an indelible mark. The simple white cloth covering the altar is still stained by the blood of the victims, and the cool dark interior is pierced by the sun’s rays, filtering through the holes in the ceiling left by the shrapnel and bullets.
In the middle of the room is a staircase leading to the basement. There stands a three-layered glass pyramid. The top holds the bones of many of the victims, yellowing with the passing of time. The middle layer carries the skulls of 156 people, some obviously those of children. Many have visible cracks where the machetes hit, or where the bullets pierced. In the final and bottom layer lies one coffin, that of a pregnant woman who was gang raped before being speared to death.
There is no solace to be found outside the church either. Behind the structure lie two underground bunkers. A staircase leads to the heart of both. Countless coffins are stacked on shelves, some with names, and others simply unmarked. Nyamata’s province alone has recovered the bodies of 75,000 people, and is still unearthing victims to this day -- twelve years after the nightmare that gripped this tiny country ended, and in its wake left 800,000 dead.
We headed back to Kigali, hitting the same dirt road that led us to Nyamata. All along the way, people trekked up and down the road, going on with their lives. The more we drove, the more normal day-to-day scenes we witnessed: Children returning from school, women carrying jugs of water on their heads. The lucky ones bicycled their way home or carried umbrellas to shield them from the unforgiving sun. I wondered how the genocide touched their lives. How many loved ones did they lose? Were the people around us victims or perpetrators of the kinds of crimes we just witnessed? Somehow, on the surface, it did not seem to matter.
Rwanda may not have forgotten, but it is trying to move on.
Editor's note: Paul is in Africa in advance of Brian's trip next week. Brian will be reporting from Nigeria, Mali and Ghana about the extraordinary work U2 singer Bono has done for the continent. He also promises to blog on the trip, connectivity willing, and we'll post photos of the church mentioned in this post as soon as we can.
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IS IT HIM?
The United States did nothing in Rwanda, but it is unfair to say we would have, had the Rwandans had oil. Just look at the situation in the Sudan today. The citizens of Darfur (the ones being driven from their homes, raped, and massacred by an Arab militia sanctioned by the Sudanese government) have control of a large amount of oil, and the United States has still failed to intervene. President Bush absolutely should not be commended for his actions regarding Darfur- since declaring it a genocide, the United States has done next to nothing to halt the genocide occurring. We have passed a few meaningless bills through Congress, and have introduced resolutions into the UN that are too little, too late. As concerned citizens, we should be ashamed that our government, which purports to spread democracy throughout the world, has failed to help the hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians who have been mercilessly slaughtered in Darfur. And I am a staunch conservative.
Kari, Eaton Rapids, MI (Sent May 18, 2006 5:24:13 PM)
Why is it that, "different nations can travel to Africa to steal gold, diamonds and other precious stones from its inhabitants, but cannot spend the same BILLIONS to stablize it"?
Niche (Sent May 18, 2006 5:14:51 PM)
As long as we allow entire groups of people to be stereo typed or classed as evil or good, we take away their claim to humanity and allow this to occur. An "evil" group justifies destruction. A "good" group can do no wrong.
Bill B., Louisville, KY (Sent May 18, 2006 5:06:00 PM)
What is even more sad is that 12 years later it is happening in other parts of Africa. What can we do this time to help?
Amanda, Madison, WI (Sent May 18, 2006 4:57:48 PM)
If I understood it right it was Christian against Cristian and Muslim against Muslim because it was all a war about 'looks' and the width of the nose and being place in a category based on mostly this!! Sad it is......
D Hughes Indpls IN (Sent May 18, 2006 4:50:35 PM)
The attacks were Hutu vs. Tutsi, and not Christian vs. Muslim...
(Sent May 18, 2006 4:46:32 PM)
Whoever wrote the comment wether or not this was a christian church or if the attackers were muslim, obviously doesn't understand the history of Rwanda. You may want to rent the movie Hotel Rwanda to get caught up on the facts in a short period of time. It is a good movie and insightful on the incidents that took place.
Cory, Showlow Arizona (Sent May 18, 2006 4:44:33 PM)
This was a case not of religious fanaticism but rather a simple issue of how people looked. Their facial features. It was the Tutsi's vs the Hutu's and it all came down to the way each one's facial features compered to each group and the hate that this fuled over decades. As the politically correct in the country say..it was black on black crime.
GB, Leesburg VA (Sent May 18, 2006 4:41:52 PM)
We (United States) HAD time to intervene. We knew exactly what was going on. UN "peacekeepers" saw it all. Despite numerous pre- and present-conflict warnings by Canadian Lieutenant-General Roméo Dallaire of the UN peacekeeping troops, we still did NOTHING. We must remember that this country did not serve our needs. What went on here was a million times worse than what was going on in Iraq before we invaded. If only Rwandans would have had oil. So for the millionth time our rich policy makers who are in bed with corporate leaders choose to ignore people in dire need. Profit over people. THIS IS EXACTLY HOW IT WORKS.
Carson Betsinger, MN (Sent May 18, 2006 4:41:36 PM)
This should have never been allowed to happen. In this day and age. Where was the UN, the church, the US? There is so much discussion about the sanctity of life, and how meaningless this phrase is when compared to what happens in certain Third world countries.
I do not agree with President Bush on almost all of his policies, foreign and other wise, but he has taken action with regard to the genocide in Darfur. We should congratulate him on taking these steps for what appears to be for all the right reasons. And urge him to continue to do more. This is how the US can and should regain some stature in the world.
Tim Maguire, Juneau Alaska (Sent May 18, 2006 4:38:50 PM)
What difference does it make if the attackers were Muslim or not? Do evangelicals really need to fuel more anti-Mulsim hatred, thereby perpetrating the nonsense of "Christianity under attack?" Don't forge: it was the Christian Serbs who rampaged through Bosnia, killing thousands upon thousands of Muslims. Let's just call this what it is: ethnic cleansing. Let's leave the religious agendas out of it.
Jon V., Glendale, AZ (Sent May 18, 2006 4:35:03 PM)
It doesn't matter what the religion is. It was human against human and that is just wrong. The same thing is happening in various other places in the world today. We all need to work on "love thy neighbor".
(Sent May 18, 2006 4:32:06 PM)
To answer the question above, this genocide had nothing to do with religion. Most of the churches in Rwanda are Catholic and the killers AND victims were primarily Catholic. The genocide was based on ethnicity -- the Hutu majority killing ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus.
Richard Adam, Los Angeles, CA (Sent May 18, 2006 4:13:34 PM)
Actually Muslimns helped a lot of Rwandans during the genocide. To answer your question, Rwandan genocide was a christian on christian genocide.
Asif Bashir (Sent May 18, 2006 4:12:37 PM)
I'd like to recommend reading "Left To Tell: Discovering God amidst the Rwandan Holocaust" by Immaculee Ilibagiza, a woman who survived the slaughter in Rwanda at age 22. Immaculee tells of the horrific ordeal that griped her family and country, while bringing inspiration through her faith.
Deborah R., Chesterfield, MO (Sent May 18, 2006 4:10:20 PM)
I don't understand why the world stood silent.
Kim, Camas, Washington. (Sent May 18, 2006 4:08:32 PM)
What a sobering tale. It certainly makes our everyday problems pale...and one can almost sense the tears of Angels.
(Sent May 18, 2006 4:07:42 PM)
Does that matter? Evil people come from all religious backgrounds and races.
(Sent May 18, 2006 4:07:11 PM)
I don't understand why the world stood silent watching all the Tutsis get sklaughtered at the hands of the Hutu.
annon. Vancouver Washington (Sent May 18, 2006 4:06:25 PM)
I was in Rwanda las week. It is a beautiful country with incredibly nice people. It is hard to imagine that these type of atrocities occured there. I'm sure the church was a Christian church, and the attackers were not Muslim. Rwanda does not have many Muslims and this was not a religious war as we tend to stereotype conflicts in today's environment.
Todd, Little Rock (Sent May 18, 2006 4:06:19 PM)
I am so saddened by this. My heart aches for these people-this country. It doesn't matter their religion or race. They were human beings! They were people like you and I. It could have been you and I.... May we not take our life, this life we live, in the FREE USA, for granted any longer. May you get the FULL understanding of how priveledged a society we truly are, after reading something like this. May you be grateful your children, Mother & Father and siblings are safe. May you be grateful that you have eyes to see, hands to work and feet to get you to your destination. No, things are not perfect. But by this article, may you know the reality of the statement, "there is always someone worse off than myself." By reading this article, I hope we, as a society, wake up to our lives and be grateful. Stop the complaining!! Be grateful for a change.
M.T., Wilmington, DE (Sent May 18, 2006 4:04:23 PM)
Rwanda offers no lessons on religious intolerance. The well documented genocide was based upon politics and economics. The evidence is so deep on that point that to suggest religion as the cause seems ignorant. The deaths of 800,000 people in about 100 days seems important enough to neg research not speculation offering no value.
Bill Wright, WI (Sent May 18, 2006 4:03:12 PM)
What was I doing on that day? Probably the usual mundane things: work, dinner with a friend, watching tv, sleeping in the safety of my home... How precious these things seem when I think about the terror those people were facing half way around the world. I remember the images on the news at the time - I did not understand and certainly could not comprehend the magnitude of the horror. I feel guilty - I think we all bear some blame for not intervening more decisively to stop this slaughter.
Tom Forster, Birmingham, Alabama, USA (Sent May 18, 2006 3:58:30 PM)
It's hard to believe I'm just barely 18 and already mad at the world for doing nothing to help the tutsi. I think all the Interhamwe should get the same death as their victims. Everybody knows the Hutus shot down their own president out of spite because he was signing the peace accords and so that they could have a reason to kill hundreds of thousands of innocent tutsi by blaming Habyarimana's death on them. How can people be so cruel.
(Sent May 18, 2006 3:53:53 PM)
No, the Rwandan conflict was based on race and tribal ancestry, rather than religion... Watch the movie "Hotel Rwanda", it will explain a lot in a couple of hours.
insight (Sent May 18, 2006 3:47:57 PM)
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