In January, the Vatican was abuzz with news of the eminent rehabilitation of four clergy men – all members of the fundamentalist Society of St. Pius X – who had been excommunicated in 1988. The announcement could not have come at a worse time. Only days before, one of the Bishops, Richard Williamson, had created a maelstrom world-wide for his revisionist views of the Jewish holocaust. The man had downplayed the genocide on Swedish state TV, asserting that only between 200,000 and 300,000 were “murdered” and none passed through the gas chambers! This was the person the Vatican wanted to bring out from the cold. The international furore that followed the saga was only maintained because of the powerful Jewish lobby, causing St. Peter’s spin doctors to work overtime in damage control. But not so, for some related incident somewhere near the East African coast. For the second time, a Roman Catholic priest has been found guilty of taking part in the 1994 Genocide of Tutsis in Rwanda. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) based in the northern part of Tanzania, yesterday sentenced Fr. Emmanuel Rukundo two 25 years in jail.
In January, the Vatican was abuzz with news of the eminent rehabilitation of four clergy men – all members of the fundamentalist Society of St. Pius X – who had been excommunicated in 1988. The announcement could not have come at a worse time.
Only days before, one of the Bishops, Richard Williamson, had created a maelstrom world-wide for his revisionist views of the Jewish holocaust.
The man had downplayed the genocide on Swedish state TV, asserting that only between 200,000 and 300,000 were "murdered” and none passed through the gas chambers! This was the person the Vatican wanted to bring out from the cold.
The international furore that followed the saga was only maintained because of the powerful Jewish lobby, causing St. Peter’s spin doctors to work overtime in damage control. But not so, for some related incident somewhere near the East African coast.
For the second time, a Roman Catholic priest has been found guilty of taking part in the 1994 Genocide of Tutsis in Rwanda.
The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) based in the northern part of Tanzania, yesterday sentenced Fr. Emmanuel Rukundo two 25 years in jail.
The court also found the Man-of God guilty of raping some of his flock. His colleague, Athanase Seromba was sentenced by the UN tribunal to life in prison last year.
A third is still on trial. Has the Vatican even hinted at excommunicating the duo? Wapi! As they say, day-dreaming stops here.
One fails to understand why the church relegates its third world followers, to the bottom ladder of its faithful yet it’s the only place that it still wields some clout?
Are Seromba and Rukundo – who have the blood of millions on their hands, – more important to the Church than Bishop Williamson, to the extent of spiriting them away to Europe complete with new identities after the Genocide?
Wasn’t Seromba working as a parish priest in Florence, Italy, under the names of Don Anastasio Sumba Bura, a Congolese national? Who pulled the strings? We are possibly missing something here.
Ends