The Catholic Church last week concluded a report for beatification and canonization of Cyprien and Daphrose Rugamba, and their six children, the report was presented during a mass on Thursday last week.

The family was killed in the Genocide against Tutsi by the former presidential guards on April 7, 1994. 

The cause for canonization of the family was opened by the Catholic Church on October 2, 2015.

Canonization is an official and definitive statement from the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, recognizing a deceased person as holy. Canonization leads the worship of the saint on a universal scale, whereas beatification leads to the worship in the specific diocese they lived in.

How did the process unfold?

Father Jean-Bosco Ntagungira, the Parish Priest at Regina Pacis Catholic Church in Gasabo District, who headed the investigations and the effort to compile the report, breaks down the canonization journey of the family.

"People who lived with them and knew them for their extraordinary works came forward and put in their request for the investigation to begin, when they presented evidence of how their lives changed because of the Rugambas, we started the journey of the investigations at the smallest level,” he said, adding that this is the standard procedure.

The Catholic Church then set up a committee in charge of the investigations with members including authors, auditors, defendants and an episcopal delegate who goes way and beyond to authenticate the testimonies collected.

"The process took many years because we had to interview a lot of people, and only one individual per day and each one of them has to answer more than 150 questions, and every testimony we receive is carefully laid out and processed and recorded,” he added.

However, the journey for the family to be named saints is far from over, as the voluminous report that was finalized will now be sent to The Vatican for further review.

"Once the report is in Vatican there is a committee in charge that will carefully review it, in two or three years that is when we expect the answer, if positive the family will be named ‘venerable’ and after that, we wait for a miracle from them and they can be proclaimed by the Pope as the blessed and eventually become saints,” he added.

If canonized the Rugamba family will be the second family of saints in the Catholic Church globally, and the first saints in Rwanda.

"Making this family saints will be a pride not only to the Catholic Church but the whole country and come as an example to the younger generation and Rwandan families, who will draw lessons from the lives of this family,” Father Ntagungira added.

Why the Rugamba family?

According to Ntagungira this family, basing on their acts, exemplified love and unity not only in the church but for every family and this made them be considered for sainthood.

"The particularity of this family is their love and unity, they always showed towards each other till the end of their lives, that is why we are asking them to be made saints as a whole family” he said.

He, alongside his wife Daphrose, was also among the 2018 Unity Award recipients by the Government of Rwanda in recognition of their role in fostering unity and fighting discriminatory behavior of the genocidal regime.

"For example through "Communauté de l’Emmanuel” they preached unity and peace among Rwandans, to the point that the members of the community did not participate in the Genocide, this shows just how much they were an example to a community at large, and their actions have truly affected others,” he added.

Their acts cost them their lives during the Genocide against the Tutsi.

This sentiment is shared by Agnes Kamatali who was a close friend of the family, and describes them as ‘loving and exemplary’.

"I met Cyprien and Daphrose Rugamba in January 1991, during mass where they never ceased to talk about unity and kept reminding us to love one another, and forgive those who hurt us because they are also ‘children of God’, they had a way of living in harmony with their neighbours, they helped poor people, and helped other couples who were struggling, by providing counsel and helped them solve their marital problems,” she said.

"To this date, every time I pray for them. To me, they are already saints because their actions changed my life and I still go by the principles I learnt from them 30 years ago,” she added.

Kamatali added that through their Christianity principles, people saw them as saints even before their death.

In 1992, the couple started an organization of taking care and feeding street children which still exists now as Centre Cyprien et Daphrose Rugamba (CECYDAR), located in Kicukiro District.

According to Jean-Baptiste Ndayambaje, educator at CECYDAR, the idea of the centre was Daphrose Rugamba’s who instead of turning away the street children who used to steal the potatoes she was selling, she instead decided to help and feed them and take care of them.

"The couple taught us to love these children, who are in the streets because they have not received love from where they come from, and they used to humble themselves in front of these children and offer them nothing but love. This taught us something as a community and to this date we go by their teachings about love,” he said.

Besides his humanitarian work, Cyprien Rugamba is one of Rwanda’s most celebrated musical legends, having founded a group called ‘Amasimbi n’Amakombe’.

He was known for composing songs such as ‘Ubuhanga Buhanitse’, ‘Urungano’, and ‘Imenagitero’ as well as other songs that are sung today in the Rwandan Catholic Church.