Pastor Gatera was born in a refugee camp in Rwanda. His parents fled Burundi to find safety there in the 1970s. Gatera was a teenager when he was forced to flee Rwanda due to the infamous 1994 genocide. He initially fled to neighboring Congo, but kept running when the violence in Rwanda followed him there. He ended up in a refugee camp in Tanzania. When the Tanzanian government decided to no longer host Burundian refugees, he had to flee again - this time to Kenya. He ended up spending the next 20 years in Kakuma refugee camp (near Kenya's border with South Sudan).

A refugee church welcomed him and helped him survive in that harsh place. It was through their ministry that Gatera put his faith in Jesus.

God used the refugee church to awaken his faith in Jesus.

He became a well-known and highly respected pastor in the camp - a leader of leaders. It was under his leadership that United Refugee and Host Churches (URHC) grew into an association of churches from both the camp and surrounding host community. They've grown to include over 160 churches from diverse national, ethnic, lingual and denominational backgrounds. URHC ministries include the Kakuma Interdenominational School of Mission (KISOM), an annual Refugee Youth Camp, and much more.

In 2016, Gatera and his wife and three children were resettled from Kakuma to Minneapolis. We count it a high privilege that he has since joined the IAFR team and serves as our Refugee Church Consultant.

I don't know how he does it while working full-time and raising a family, but he manages to regularly consult with URHC leadership back in Kakuma, while also consulting with many refugee churches here in the USA (e.g. Denver, Fargo, Kansas City, Iowa, and here in the Twin Cities). Most recently, a refugee church in Malawi requested to consult with him.

You can partner with Pastor Gatera!

Click here to donate today!

Any monthly support amount helps! Choose what works best for you.

Pastor Gatera needs to raise $3,100/month in order to be able to quit his full-time job cleaning buildings and serve full-time with IAFR. He doesn't have a large network of people in the US and so we're reaching out to you to ask if you would prayerfully consider getting behind his remarkable ministry.

I hope you get the privilege of meeting Pastor Gatera one day. You'll be a better person for it. I know I am.