A Question of Faith

When I got into work on Monday morning I was approached by my best Rwandan office friend, Guido, and asked what I had done at the weekend. He usually asks me that question and I always regale him with the exciting things that I may have got up to including incomprehensible trips into the adjacent valley in search of birds and the ultimate source of the Nile. This time his question was different and it was the one that I had been dreading: "did you pray yesterday" he inquired, with what I thought was a bit of cheek in his gap-toothed smile? At last! I should have been expecting it and he'd obviously been plucking up courage to ask. After all, he, like countless other Rwandans, spends large parts of his Sunday in church and I had been repeatedly told at group training sessions that my religion would be a subject of much interest to locals - not far behind my marital status and age! By the way, I have taken to being 25 again when children ask as I can't be bothered getting on my cultural high horse and explaining that age is usually not the second question to put to grey-haired western visitors. Or maybe I'm just suffering from a sexagenarian hang up!

Anglican Church opposite my work. Stella teaches here twice a week

Leaving me time to concoct a response Guido suddenly disappeared saying there was an Anglican pastor outside that he was going to fetch. My heathenism was going to be put on office show for all to witness! If the question had been 'what is your religion?' it would have been easily countered. I was brought up a Protestant. Matter closed. We have a volunteer friend who lives further into the boondock bible belt and she has decided to share her ideal of Humanism with anyone who asks. But in this case it was impossible. The question could not be dodged; did you pray yesterday does not permit use of the metaphorical hedge trimmers.

Camus was a good goalie but I think JPS was better at table football

A non-work buddy was sitting next to me in the office. I have been helping him to apply for a teaching job where I know he would excel. He was smirking wondering how I was going to respond and I'll tell you why. Recently I wore my Philosophy Football T-shirt to a big Premier League game at St Joseph's bar. Sartre and the number 10 are written on the back. (Somehow I see Jean Paul more as an outside left than in the inside left position!) This friend suddenly shouted out - as a theatrical player was writhing on the ground pole-axed by a puff of wind - that JPS was an existentialist and then asked me aloud, in front of the expectant barroom, if it was true that such people did not believe in God. You can imagine how the room reacted. It's not the kind of thing you say to a group of people who can't comprehend the idea of atheism! The choice was stark. Get into a deep theological and philosophical discussion with a muzungu in a variety of languages or continue to bait Wayne Rooney on the TV screen. It was a no brainer - I had to rush back home and fetch my copy of Richard Dawkins in order to sustain my argument. Hence his smirk now.

Catholic Church but as you can see they all really look the same

By this time Guido had returned and true to his word there was another gentleman at his shoulder. I was hoping the whole issue would have blown over and we could get back to a fresh round of 'mwaramutsis' but it was not to be. Guido turned to the pastor and said 'I was just asking Denis if he prayed yesterday'. There wasn't even a beating about the bush with a rephrasing of the question to give me a chance to waffle. And no, tempted though I may have been, I wasn't going to give a cheeky or pretentious answer such as, ' yes, I was down in the valley worshipping the majesty of nature's fecundity'.

Evangelical Restoration Church behind our house

"Well, did you?" said the eager cleric suddenly right in front of my desk. "No", was all I could muster. "Why don't you pray", he pressed on,
furthering my discomfort? I was now trapped so I performed that old Jesuit trick and answered a question with a question. This is a complicated subject, I pre-ambled with a smile, but I could easily ask you, 'why do you pray?' Match drawn, 1-1. As Jean Paul himself nearly said: 'everything is complicated by the presence of the opposite point of view.' Both teams recognised that the office on an early Monday morning was not the best place to carry out a theological debate and it was agreed to re-schedule a discussion on the topic for a later date. We shall see.

Wise words from JPS

My mischievous friend leaned across after they'd gone and said that there are plenty of Rwandans whose faith was shattered because of the genocide and no longer attend church especially of the Catholic persuasion given their complicity in many of the atrocities. However, life is hard and comfort still much needed and this has led to a phenomenal growth of new evangelical and Pentecostal churches. The rapture coming from two of them close to our house has already been mentioned in a previous post you may recall. Increasing numbers of Rwandans are even establishing their own churches although others look askance at what they see as individuals seizing on religion as a business opportunity. And naturally the American evangelicals, with typical, entrepreneurial zest, are forging into this growing field of ecstatic soul redemption. Dawkins' vision of a god-free world is quite a way off.