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Evangelical Missions and African Initiatives

be discouraged, but send someone else immediately to take the vacant
place.’” (1977, 19)

Mackay’s words reflected the reality of the day, for in the 1870s
Europeans did not know the cause of malaria. Some people thought
it was the bad air of the African swamps. It was some time later when
medical experts discovered that the mosquito was the culprit.

MacKay was convinced that the Christian message would bring the
kingdom of God to Uganda. Unfortunately, the Roman Catholic Church
came to Uganda and presented a different kind of Christianity. When
Mutesa heard what appeared to be a conflicting gospel or perhaps when
he was persuaded by the appeal of Islam, he turned away from the
Christian message in 1879. His turning away from Christianity caused
conflict among Christians, adherents of African traditional religion,
and Muslims that led to what has been called “the wars of religion
and the Christian revolution” (Shaw 1996, 201). In 1886, thirty-one
Christians, both Catholic and Protestants, were martyred for their faith
at Namugongo. Anderson describes the event this way.

The fire of Namugongo did more than burn to ashes the bodies
of thirty-one Christians. Mukajanga and executioners danced
around the burning pyre shouting, “It is not we who are killing
you.… All the gods whom you have despised and called demons,
it is they who are killing you.” The young men replied, “If the
demons are killing us, it is you who are their slaves.” (1977, 32)

Nevertheless, the gates of Hades would not prevail against God’s
church. Even though Mackay died in 1890, by this time the gospel had
spread to the Toro, Ankole, Busoga, Teso, and Acholi. The result is that
the Christian church is strong in Uganda today.

The Leap Inland

Peter Cameron Scott came to know Christ in a personal way as a
young man. He enrolled in the New York Missionary Training College to
prepare for missionary ministry, and then, in 1890, he sailed for Africa.
His brother John followed a few months later, and they did missionary

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