Why this building matters
Rwanda's shift to a predominantly Christian country did not happen gradually from the bottom up. It turned on the court, and it turned here. The church was built under King Mutara III Rudahigwa, who was himself baptised in it — the first Rwandan monarch to convert. Where the king went, the kingdom followed, and the pace of conversion after that was extraordinary.
The 1946 consecration
In 1946 Mutara III delivered a speech at Christ-Roi consecrating Rwanda to Christ. The occasion is still commemorated annually. It is the clearest single moment of the fusion of church and state in Rwandan history, and it explains a great deal about the position the church occupied in the decades that followed — including the very difficult questions about that position in 1994.
The missionary connection
The site was associated with the White Fathers, the Catholic missionary order that worked closely with the monarchy, and it is where Aloys Bigirumwami — Rwanda's first Rwandan Catholic bishop — was ordained. Church and court operated out of the same small town, which is exactly the point.
Visiting
Short — half an hour to forty-five minutes. It is the opening stop on both the Nyanza city tour and the Royal Trail, and it works best in that position: it sets up everything you then see at the palace and the mausoleum. Services are held here; visit around them, not through them.