Church leaders in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have distanced themselves from the impression of lending support to insurrection after a video of a politician who heads an armed rebel group speaking at a Catholic parish went viral. Source: Crux.
On July 14, Corneille Nangaa, an Evangelical Protestant and the founder of the Alliance Fleuve Congo (Congo River Alliance), a rebel group with links to the Rwanda-backed M23 rebel movement, attended a Catholic Mass at a parish in Rutshuru, located in the North Kivu province of the DRC, Africa’s largest Catholic country.
Video of the appearance has become a social media sensation in Congo, where the country’s 60 million Catholics represent more than half of the national population, and the Church has long played a critical role in political life.
Controversy arose after the video appeared, with many observers suggesting it created the impression that the Church was backing the rebel groups.
In response, the secretary general of the National Episcopal Conference of Congo issued a statement insisting that Mr Ndanga’s appearance had come as a “shock” to Church leaders, and that it did not imply any endorsement of his positions.
“Far from being an expression of the Catholic Church’s support for the rebels, as some ill-intentioned people think, this is rather an incident that occurred to the great surprise of the officiating priest in the context we can all imagine,” Msgr Donatien Nshole said.
Msgr Nshole said the impromptu speech violated a 14-year-old bishops’ conference policy against allowing politicians to speak during worship services “for propagandistic purposes.”
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Congo church distances itself from rebels after pol’s speech in parish (By Ngala Killian Chimtom, Crux)
