1964 — The Canonization of the Uganda Martyrs

On October 18, 1964, in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, Pope Paul VI canonized 22 Ugandan martyrs, the first Black African saints of the modern church. Nearly 80 years earlier, these young men, pages in the court of the king of Buganda, had refused to renounce their Christian faith. Most were burned alive at Namugongo in 1886, choosing death rather than surrender the belief they had taken as their own.

Their courage made Uganda the beating heart of African Christianity. Every year, millions of pilgrims still walk to Namugongo to honour them. A canonization in Rome, eight decades after the fires, carried their names around the world, but the memory itself had never left home.