Ministry update. From Left Christophe and his wife Diana, in the middle Denys and his wife Judith, Sylvestre and his wife Natacha at right.

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Ministry update Since 2004, Christophe, Denys and Sylvestre have been worked in CARSA ministry fulltime. God has helped them to accomplish an awesome work in trauma healing and reconciliation among Rwandans. The team is very active in secondary schools, universities, and within community. In response to God's calling for reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18), CARSA exists to serve the people of great lakes region in supporting their journey towards healing, forgiveness, reconciliation and sustainable holistic development. Since January 2010, the number of CARSA staff and volunteers has been increased. Three women have joined the team. This can be a strong support for we had been working without any women among the team. It will be a great input to extend and move the work forward, to strengthen the team, as we believe in unity in diversity. From Left Christophe and his wife Diana, in the middle Denys and his wife Judith, Sylvestre and his wife Natacha at right. The more the number of workers is increased, the more CARSA is carrying out its objectives. Few months ago, we started operating in the East of CONGO, North Kivu province. This region has been affected different wars and influenced by Rwandan ethnic conflicts since 2,000,000 Rwandese fled to that area after the 1994 genocide. CARSA will focus its work on healing and reconciliation ministry and then mobilize the church leaders, the emerging leaders and the youth in general to come and work together in unity and complementarity as different parts of one body of Christ in Congo. Since February 2010, we have moved to a new office which is big than what we had before. It has 3 rooms, a bath room, a prayer room and seating room in which we can run small workshop and meetings. This is enough space to host the current team, volunteers and interns who may join us to support the ministry.

ACHIEVEMENT Capacity building For six Fridays beginning in January, all CARSA s team members attended the course about leadership foundation. None of us had considered the importance of our life experiences, the shaping of our character and our values as a foundational influence on our leadership. It has been so exciting to watch God work deeply in our lives as we grappled with ideas about leader, leadership, and particularly with God wanting to lead through us based upon who we are and our relationship with him, not what we can do (e.g. skill and performance). As we formulated individually our bible mandate, articulated personnel values, life time line, mandate statement, and mission statement, we discovered that what we experienced in our lives has shaped us to become who we are today. We realized that what is important to God is our being than our doing. Apart from that, the whole team has been trained how to facilitate a healing wounds of ethnic conflicts as we were prepared to hold such a seminar in Goma, ( North Kivu province of democratic Republic of Congo).It was very helpful to know how we can adapt the material to a group of people from different countries and cultures who went through ethnic conflicts. In order to have the common understanding about its Vision, Mission and strategies to reach its goal, CARSA has organized a staff prayer retreat from January 11-15, 2010. This retreat was very helpful to every member team as we understood what God wants us to do in the ministry, our philosophy and How to work as team. We are now experiencing the improvement and it s really excitement to see how different gifts, different skills are put together to move the ministry forward. One of the new comers said Before joining CARSA, I felt far from the ministry, but now as I work with my husband, I feel involved, and realized that God unified us as a couple to serve Him in such time as this. For we are God s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do Healing and reconciliation Seminar in Goma (DRC) From April 2 nd -4 th, 2010 CARSA held trauma healing and reconciliation seminar for the youth from 8 different ethnic groups and different denominations exiting in North Kivu province. 39 participants attended the seminar; among them 8 people from Germany and 1 people from Rwanda. It was a new experience for the facilitation team to have the participants from three different countries, different cultures, different experiences gathered in one seminar. This was very helpful for the whole process of the seminar; especially in changing the mindsets of the participants about people from other countries; Africans towards

Europeans and vice versa; Congolese towards Rwandese and vice versa. Apart from this there were also different prejudices among Congolese from different ethnic groups. One young girl from Germany said I have to change my prejudice towards Africans. In addition, they shared experiences of what they passed through during ethnic conflicts, what they lost and how they were affected by the wars and conflicts. This helped to understand and sympathize with one other and confess, and/or standing in the gap and asking for forgiveness on behalf of their respective ethnic groups for all that they offended to others. At the end of the seminar, we celebrated our unity and reconciliation and many of the participants could testify how God touched their hearts and healed them from the ethnic hatred, prejudice and division. Others testified how the Holy Spirit convinced them to confess the role they have played during the conflicts and wars. Seminar in Agriculture and husbandry Institute As we were running a seminar in Goma, the rest of the team were in the north of Rwanda where they held a healing and reconciliation workshop for 50 students from different denominations, and different ethnic groups. The seminar took place within the campus from April 2 nd 4 th, 2010. God touched the hearts of most of the participants. It was surprise to see how the young survivors, who were 4 and 5 years old during the time of genocide, have now an anger and hatred against their colleagues from Hutu ethnic group who have also the same age. This is a vicious circle which may cause other tragedies, injustice, wounds and conflicts for the future generation if nothing is done to break that circle. At the other hand, it was a hope and encouragement to see how they were changed just after the teachings. God touched their hearts and heal their inner wounds. One young genocide survivor said I learnt from my relatives that all Hutu are killers, I had taken all they told me on trust. At the end of the seminar, the participants were made a significant step in healing and were committed to take the massage wherever they will go especially to their colleagues who are still divided because of the wrong prejudices. Mourning week From April 7-13, Rwanda has been commemorating for the 16 th the 94 genocide perpetrated against the Tutsi. Some days before April, the Mental Heath released a report showing 30percents of Rwandans living with trauma. All was asking why the trauma is increasing instead of going down. The report says that the youth were the most affected, which is understandable because they were at the early age as the genocide was perpetrated.

The youth who participated in the conferences were active and receptive In collaboration with other Christian organizations, we gave the message of healing, repentance and forgiveness in 4 sites of Kigali city council where at least 1500 youth from different denominations were gathered to receive the message. For the first time, we saw the involvement and collaboration of the church in preparing different events. The church officials were invited by government and private institutions to address the people. We believe this is the fruits of the last July repentance! By the end of the conferences some participants could testify how they were influenced and affected by the elder people about prejudices and ethnic hatred. They changed their mindset and committed to change others. We were also amazed to see the CARSA s team working as couples, the youth were challenged by seeing a couple working hand in hand to heal and reconcile others. It changed the mindsets of many youth to hear Judith; a woman Tutsi and genocide survivor married Denis a Hutu. At the end of the seminar, one young lady said, I have a boy friend from Hutu ethnic group, we love and appreciate each other, I was wondered myself how I will marry Him. But I realized that we have to change and make a new History. This is one of the key problems the Rwandan youth face as they are thinking of getting married. And the most of the time, they are influenced by the old people who are still bound at ethnic hatred. If we want to ensure a peaceful future, we have to invest more in the youth for they can make a new history! Rwanda new era convention; the way forward

In order to prepare the National repentance of the church of Christ in Rwanda, the members of the national committee of Rwanda new era convention have been met regularly since last July to discuss how to move the work forward. Last week, we met in the south province. The meeting was hosted by the president of the national committee in his diocese at Kigeme in The south province of Rwanda. I was impressed to see the other church leaders moving from Kigali to Kigeme and gathering there in the Anglican diocese to make a strategic plan for 3 years and pray together for the healing of the nation. The church leaders will take the message of repentance in their own churches, and facilitate its integration to the lower level of church leadership. This will make all Christians involved in a national event where the church of Christ in Rwanda will formally and publically present its confession of repentance to God and to the Rwandan society in 2012. Apart from integration of the message of repentance in different denominations, the church leaders will meet every year in a national conference to do a kind of assessment of the work that will have been done within different denominations. They decided also to carry out a spiritual mapping of Rwanda and pray for some places which have a spiritual impact on the nation. Building friendship: In order to strengthen the friendship, relationship among CARSA s team members, we meet every three months for fellowship to pray, share the food together and relax at the house of one couple of the team. Last time, we were blessed to have the friends from Germany among us and had good time together. CARSA and God CARES teams at Sylvester s house during last fellowship.

Prayer requests Rwanda new era convention: Please pray for the integration of the message of repentance within denominations. New comers: Pray for the integration and the God s guidance of new comers who joined the team. They need to be equipped and prepared in order to be a blessing and effective for the work that God has committed into their hands. Provision: Pray that God provides for all activities as well as for the basic needs of the team members to work in good conditions. This includes the equipment and rent of a new office we have moved in since February 2010. Ministry in North Kivu province: Pray for CARSA s registration process underway in North Kivu province. This will allow CARSA to operate freely and extend the ministry in the villages such as Masisi and Rutsuru areas.