C.Ep.R : 2022 - 2023, Year of School Education

The Catholic Bishops of Rwanda have declared that the pastoral year 2022-2023 will be called the "Year of Education in Schools". This is one of the resolutions of their first quarterly meeting of the year 2022, held in Kigali from 1 to 4 April 2022. It was chaired by His Excellency Bishop Philip RUKAMBA, Bishop of the Diocese of Butare and President of the Conférence Episcopale du Rwanda (C.Ep.R).

In the closing communiqué, the Bishops of the Catholic Church in Rwanda reaffirm that education at home is supported by education by the wider community, reinforced by educators of all kinds until the child is sufficiently adult to be able to educate others. They also point out that partnerships are important to ensure that the child does not fall between different levels of care.
The Catholic Bishops of Rwanda affirm that “quality education is based on home schooling and is supported by a comprehensive and coherent curriculum based on solid teaching of knowledge and commitment like that of God, to help children.”
They promise that the various activities that will characterize the forthcoming pastoral year thus envisaged are being carefully planned so that everyone is involved and that the school helps the children to become real people and the teachers to be real parents proud of their vocation..
The Holy Father urges the world to work hard to raise an integral man
In his message on the occasion of the 55th World Day of Peace celebrated on January 1, 2022, Pope Francis expressed outrage for that in recent years, there has been a significant reduction worldwide in funding for education and training as these have been seen more as expenditures rather than investments while military expenditures, on the other hand, have increased. Yet teaching and education are the primary means of promoting integral human development. “Teaching and education are the foundations of a cohesive civil society capable of generating hope, prosperity and progress," Pope Francis said.
In the same message, Pope Francis said that it is high time, that governments develop economic policies aimed at inverting the proportion of public funds spent on education and on weaponry. “It is my hope that investment in education will also be accompanied by greater efforts to promote the culture of care, which, in the face of social divisions and unresponsive institutions, could become a common language working to break down barriers and build bridges,” he added.
The sovereign pontiff also indicates that it is essential, to forge a new cultural paradigm through “a global pact on education for and with future generations, one that commits families, communities, schools, universities, institutions, religions, governments and the entire human family to the training of mature men and women”. “By investing in the education and training of younger generations, we can help them – through a focused programme of formation – to take their rightful place in the labour market,” he concludes.
Statistics from 2019 show that the Catholic Church in Rwanda alone had over 1,370 primary and secondary schools with between 35% and 40% of all students in the country.
DOCICO/CEPR