The Rev Francois Murenzi, Bishop's Curate of Athy, Co Kildare and former curate of Bray, Co Wicklow, was buried in Roselawn Cemetery, Belfast, on Monday, following his tragic death last week after a road accident. A native of Rwanda, Murenzi (40) was the first black African ordained to the ministry of the Church of Ireland.
"He was like a breath of fresh air with an infectious laugh and delightful sense of humour," said one of his clerical colleagues. Others recalled that although his early life had marked by much pain and grief, he always bore it with a smile.
Francois Murenzi came from a second-generation Christian family in Rwanda, and both his parents were influenced by the famous East African revival, which started in Gahini, his home village.
His father, Abraham Simparimiheto, was a well-known evangelist who planted churches in four of the eight Anglican dioceses in Rwanda, while his uncle was Canon Silas Kabirigi from the Diocese of Shyira.
He was educated in Rwanda and in the Democratic Republic of Congo (then Zaire). He received a State Diploma in Commerce and Administration in 1982 and worked as a civil servant in the Ministry of Finance in Rwanda for seven years before moving to England in 1989.
Following studying at Bible colleges in London and Nantwich, he graduated with an honours BA from Manchester University in 1995. While studying at Redcliffe Bible College in London he met his Belfast-born wife, Susan (Fearon), who was training to be a missionary in Spain. They were married in Saint Donard's, Belfast, in 1993, and have four children - Mucyo (7), Ikuzwe (6), Manzi (5) and Neza (3).
In June 1994, Murenzi returned to Rwanda in the immediate aftermath of the genocide, in which up to a million people had been killed, to try to find if any of his Tutsi family had survived. He arrived in his hometown shortly after it was liberated by returning Tutsi forces to learn that his parents had been killed by a mob and their home razed to the ground.
The experience was harrowing. "I was jumping over dead bodies. I started to think about my wife I had left behind in England. What if I die here? But then I recognised that God is with me and protecting me."
His father's Hutu godson tried to hide his parents for a number of days, moving them from house to house.
Other family members were more fortunate: his brother Samuel, who had been taken prisoner by Hutu troops, was freed by the returning Tutsi forces; their sister Charlotte survived after hiding for two weeks in an attic.
Back in London, the BBC asked him how he squared his religious beliefs with the experience. But his faith had been strengthened, and he came to forgive those who killed his parents. "I let go in the end," he explained. "If I do not forgive these people I will be full of bitterness and hatred and it will do no good for my personality. They must be forgiven because Jesus's love is different - it transcends every ethnic divide and hatred."
Francois and Susan moved to Belfast, where he headed the Youth Department of the Church Mission Society Ireland (CMS Ireland) from 1996 until he began training for the ordained ministry in 1999. He studied at the Church of Ireland Theological College, receiving an M.Phil in ecumenical theology from the Irish School of Ecumenics, Trinity College Dublin.
Murenzi was ordained a deacon in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, on June 17th, 2001 - the first black African to be ordained in the Church of Ireland - and was ordained priest a year later.
He was a curate in Bray for two years until his appointment as Bishop's Curate of Athy last July. The large 19th-century rectory was alive with the sound of young children for the first time in many years, and, fired with enthusiasm for his new post, he hoped to build on his experiences of youth ministry with CMS and in Bray.
"A church without children and youth is a dying church," he said. "I would like to see more young teenagers involved in church activities ... The challenge is to bring faith alive in the community."
His parishioners in Athy have spoken of how much Murenzi had touched their lives, and how in four short months he had an impact on them and on the wider community. The Archbishop of Dublin and Bishop of Glendalough, Dr John Neill, recalling how Francois, Susan and their children had won a special place in the hearts of parishioners in Bray and in Athy, said he had "ministered with great sensitivity, bringing to many a deep joy in their faith." Father Philip Dennehy, parish priest of Athy, said: "In the short time he was here he was greatly loved by everyone."
He died on November 19th, 2003, in Beaumont Hospital, Dublin, following injuries sustained in a motor accident on November 13th.
Francois-Xavier Murenzi: born February 18th, 1963, died September 19th, 2003.