Led by Faith: Rising from the Ashes of the Rwandan Genocide » (New Edition)

Immaculée Ilibagiza was born in Rwanda and studied electronic and mechanical engineering at the National University. She lost most of her family during the 1994 genocide. Four years later, she emigrated to the United States and began working at the United Nations in New York City. She is now a full-time public speaker and writer. In 2007 she established the Left to Tell Charitable Fund, which helps support Rwandan orphans.Immaculée holds honorary doctoral degrees from The University of Notre Dame and Saint John’s University, and was awarded The Mahatma Gandhi International Award for Reconciliation and Peace 2007. She is the author, with Steve Erwin, of LEFT TO TELL: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust.

For three months in the spring of 1994, the African nation of Rwanda descended into one of the most vicious and bloody genocides the world has ever seen. Immaculée Ilibagiza, a young university student, miraculously survived the savage killing spree that left most of her family, friends, and a million of her fellow citizens dead. Immaculée’s remarkable story of survival was documented in her first book, Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust.In Led By Faith, Immaculée takes us with her as her remarkable journey continues. Through her simple and eloquent voice, we experience her hardships and heartache as she struggles to survive and to find meaning and purpose in the aftermath of the holocaust. It is the story of a naïve and vulnerable young woman, orphaned and alone, navigating through a bleak and dangerously hostile world with only an abiding faith in God to guide and protect her. Immaculée fends off sinister new predators, seeks out and comforts scores of children orphaned by the genocide, and searches for love and companionship in a land where hatred still flourishes. Then, fearing again for her safety as Rwanda’s war-crime trials begin, Immaculée flees to America to begin a new chapter of her life as a refugee and immigrant—a stranger in a strange land.With the same courage and faith in God that led her through the darkness of genocide, Immaculée discovers a new life that was beyond her wildest dreams as a small girl in a tiny village in one of Africa’s poorest countries.It is in the United States, her adopted country, where Immaculée can finally look back at all that has happenedto her and truly understand why God spared her life . . . so that she would be left to tell her story to the world.

Preface xi

Introduction: Wake-Up Call xiii

Chapter 1 Left to Tell 1

Chapter 2 Walking Through the Ruins 15

Chapter 3 Mother Mary 21

Chapter 4 Peace and Prayer 31

Chapter 5 The Power of Unconditional Love 39

Chapter 6 A New Type of Heartache 49

Chapter 7 Exiles, Exodus, and Killers Across the Water 57

Chapter 8 Looking for Miracles 73

Chapter 9 A Dream Comes True 87

Chapter 10 Office Politics 97

Chapter 11 Office Predators 107

Chapter 12 John Returns 123

Chapter 13 An Army of Love 137

Chapter 14 Bees and Blessings 147

Chapter 15 Time to Leave 161

Chapter 16 In America 171

Chapter 17 The World Hears My Story 185

Epilogue: Rwanda Rising 195

Acknowledgments 201

About the Authors 205