The Watchman

He Won the Debate. The Road Home Was Nine Miles Long.

Bernard Mulongo was 25. He pastored the New Restoration Church of Christ in Butebo District, in eastern Uganda. He had a wife and two children, ages 4 and 7.

On Saturday, July 18, he traveled to Mbale for an open air debate between Christians and Muslims. He spoke well. Pastors who were there say he spoke so well that two prominent Muslim women stood up and publicly professed Christ.

Afterward an imam named Hassan Musa came to him, according to Pastor David Omala, who was present. “Bernard, you deserve death for blasphemous deeds and leading our people to that false religion,” Musa told him. “It is not right for you to use the holy book, Quran, to mislead our members.”

That evening Mulongo spoke on a local radio program. Then he got on a motorcycle with his friend Robert Mukisa and started for their lodging. The road out of Mbale runs through Jami village, nine miles from town.

His Church Received 293 Dollars. The Court in Dak Lak Gave Him Seven and a Half Years.

The state counted the money to the last dong. It came to about 293 dollars, and it bought a pastor seven and a half years.

Two of the Three Came Home. It Took Thirteen Days for Anyone to Find Out.

Two of the three church leaders taken from Heiban were released on July 28 and August 1. The news took thirteen days to leave the Nuba Mountains, and it reached us after we published.

He Said Mass That Morning Standing In for Someone Else. He Was Found on Church Road.

Father Samuel Oyetoro filled in for a colleague on leave, said Mass, and was found on Church Road with machete wounds. Four days later gunmen took three people from a Sunday Mass in another state.

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