Responding to the crackdown on churches in Rwanda and beyond

A perspective from the UN Human Rights Council; also, reader response on Christian nationalism

Janet Epp Buckingham (foreground), director of the World Evangelical Alliance’s Geneva office, testifying at the UN Human Rights Council.

Today’s guest blog post is by Janet Epp Buckingham, director of the World Evangelical Alliance’s office in Geneva. Buckingham, a Canadian lawyer with extensive experience on religious freedom issues, represents the WEA before the United Nations Human Rights Council. She discusses here the closure of thousands of churches in Rwanda, which I previously covered in my recent interview with Reuben van Rensburg of Re-Forma.

The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) recently submitted a report on freedom of religion in Rwanda to the United Nations Human Rights Council. This submission is part of a process known as Universal Periodic Review (UPR), by which every member state of the UN undergoes a human rights review every 4.5 years.

We have long expressed concern about states that have heavy-handed regulations governing churches and other religious organizations, seeking to control rather than to regulate them. Last March, we hosted an event at the UN on this issue. The problem is notable in countries such as Algeria and Eritrea, both of which have adopted a regulatory process for registration of minority religious communities but ignore applications from Christian churches.

The trend toward strict regulation of churches in East Africa has been surprising, because these countries have majority Christian populations. Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania have all either considered or enacted laws and regulations that violate international human rights standards.

Why this move toward tighter regulation? On an FAQ page regarding the “inspection and closure of prayer houses,” the Rwandan government says, “In recent years there’s been a rapid rise in churches and prayer houses that operate in places that puts people’s lives at risk and cases of preachers engaged in exploitation of people through extorting money and property by promising miracles, encouraging harmful practices such as sowing divisionism, promoting anti vaccination ideologies and other conspiracy theories.”

In 2011, Rwanda established a regulatory framework for faith-based organizations, which was amended in 2018 and again in 2024. Each time it was amended, the standards were tightened. The current regulations require that churches must be registered before they can legally operate. Pastors must have a university degree in theology. Worship services may be conducted only in church buildings that are used solely for that purpose. Churches are required to meet high standards for health and safety as they are considered “public buildings.”

These standards are higher than in North America. They effectively prohibit house churches. They also preclude church planting, as a minimum number of members is required before a church can register. Many North American pastors do not have a university degree in theology. In addition, few university-level theology programs are available in Rwanda.

When Kenya proposed similar legislation in Kenya, in the wake of more than 400 deaths due to the tragic Shakahola cult, the Evangelical Alliance of Kenya (EAK) opposed the legislation on the basis that it gave the government too much control over religion and would limit legitimate religious activities. The WEA and the EAK made a joint submission to the UN Human Rights Council in 2024 for Kenya’s UPR. We were pleased that the government of Kenya withdrew the legislation.

It is appropriate for governments to address harm and exploitation by so-called religious leaders. But we should ask first whether existing laws and policies can be used to address the problem. If these exploitive leaders are committing fraud, there are already laws against that. Enforce the law.

There are also policy mechanisms that do not involve regulation. Governments have vast communication capacity. They can carry out media campaigns warning people about potential exploitation. They can also assign oversight responsibility to umbrella organizations such as denominations, church councils, or evangelical alliances, much as professional associations regulate professions such as medicine and law.

In these situations, it is not uncommon for governments to “use a sledgehammer to kill a mosquito.” That is, they often choose a heavy-handed response that can have negative impacts far beyond the problem they are trying to control. That is why their responses should always involve consultation with those who will be affected by policy changes.

It is also important that any policy adopted to address problems in the religious sector should comply with both constitutional protections of religious freedom and international human rights standards. These standards create a protected space for religion, safe from state interference. States cannot and should not establish educational standards for church leaders. They should not police the content of sermons, beyond prohibiting incitement to violence. Official registration should not be a requirement to hold legal worship services. Finally, there should be flexibility in where people can meet for worship. Believers should be able to assemble in homes, rented facilities, multi-use buildings or outdoors, as well as in a designated church building.

The WEA encourages government officials in Rwanda (and in other countries) to consult with national and regional church leaders to develop a regulatory framework that complies with international standards for freedom of religion or belief.

Reader response: Christian nationalism

My post last Monday brought thoughtful replies from two well-informed subscribers with whom I had corresponded previously on this topic: retired university administrator and sociologist John Hawthorne (whose book I recently cited) and retired Calvin University political scientist Corwin Smidt. Here are some of their comments.

Hawthorne argued that the five survey items on the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) scale I cited do appear to measure the concept of Christian nationalism coherently. To defend this claim, he referred to the survey's high "Cronbach's alpha" score, which assesses consistency between individual items in a questionnaire. He also pointed out that the PRRI survey does not exactly claim that 64% of white US evangelicals are Christian nationalists; rather, it says 29% are Christian nationalist "adherents" and another 35% show leanings in that direction. "Still," he said, "three in ten white evangelicals showing up as Christian nationalism adherents is a lot." He expressed his hope that other conservative evangelicals would work to "correct the harsh Christian nationalism of many popular preachers and advocates."

Smidt offered his perspective on the measures used both by PRRI and by the Baylor Religion Survey, which Andrew Whitehead and Samuel Perry cited in their 2020 book Taking America Back for God. He noted that although the six questions claim to measure Christian nationalism, only two of them mention the Christian faith. Smidt argued that measures of "Christian nationalism" often conflate two distinct concepts: (1) holding certain beliefs regarding God's special, providential involvement in US history and (2) wanting the US government to give special privileges to the Christian faith and to Christians in American public life. For Smidt, the core of Christian nationalism is this latter desire for Christians to have a privileged position.

One other reader commented that he was much more concerned about the harm Christian nationalists are causing to the US and to the credibility of the Christian gospel than about the possibility that other believers may be unfairly marked as Christian nationalists.

Reach out to me if you have further comments or questions for me, Hawthorne, or Smidt on this topic.