“The reason for coming together was to hold a conference with the goal of looking for ways and means to work together in order to better contribute as Church to peace building and to promote reconciliation in the Great Lakes Region. The theme of the conference was Conference of the Catholic Episcopate of the Great Lakes Region for Peace and Reconciliation: “God has entrusted us the ministry of reconciliation” (II Cor 5, 18)…
As a result, we identified the following four major challenges: bad governance; ethnic and tribal conflicts; widespread profound trauma; and plundering or uncontrolled exploitation of natural resources together with the subsequent destruction of the environment. At the same time we noted the following three related cross-cutting challenges: underutilization and insufficient awareness of the Church’s unique potential to promote peace and reconciliation; the lack of pertinent information on the underlying causes of our problems; and insufficient coordination of the Church’s initiatives for peace and reconciliation.” Read the full statement in English here and in French here
