Our Lady of Kibeho

Beginning on November 28, 1981, three young women at the Kibeho secondary school in southern Rwanda reported apparitions of the Virgin Mary, who identified herself as Umubyeyi w'Ijambo — Mother of the Word. Alphonsine Mumureke was the first seer; Nathalie Mukamazimpaka and Marie-Claire Mukangango followed with independent visions confirmed by investigators as independently consistent. The Virgin called for prayer, penance, and conversion, and showed the seers visions of rivers of blood and mass death. These images, met with skepticism in 1981, were seen in a different light after the 1994 Rwandan genocide, in which an estimated 800,000 people were killed. Marie-Claire was among those who died. Bishop Augustin Misago of Gikongoro approved the apparitions on June 29, 2001 — the first Vatican-recognized Marian apparitions on African soil. Marie-Claire's cause for beatification has been opened.