Comedian Ndimurukundo Elysee popularly known as ‘Pilate’ has announced that he will no longer make fun of the Catholic Church and all other religious traditions, after Bishop Simaragde Mbonyintege said it was inappropriate.

Bishop Simaragde Mbonyintege was the former Bishop of Kabgayi. He is currently retired.

Bishop Mbonyintege condemned the comedians who continue to make fun of priests and bishops, asking the government to do something new.

He said the jokes often spread widely on social media, and were seen as insulting to the religion.

He said, “These things, we have to discuss with the government so if we work together, they will be the ones who will be affected first. In the general behavior of the future. So these things are allowed to pass in the name of freedom, but there is also the prevention of human rights.”

He said that the consequences of the actions of those clowns reach the State and the religion, in one way or another.

He said, “If they don’t do it, it won’t stop us from continuing to do what we are doing, but we always know that the consequences are the State, not us. We are also affected when we see people behaving like that, but you think it is the power that people have that has no limits, that is where the world has come, then it has something else behind it, that is what brings money quickly. So you see you are buying the country money. Not understanding it and thinking about it, and thinking about where it’s happening is a waste of time.”

Bishop Mbonyintege, the former Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Kabgayi, said this while the video of the comedian Pilate messing with the priests had been circulating on social media for days; where he is seen baptizing rapper Ish Kevin and Isibo Tv reporter, popularly known as Babou.

Pilate said that he usually did not make fun of the traditions of the Catholic Church, that his pictures were leaked “while it was the first time I made fun of the priests”.

He said that he had done what he had done as art and he wanted his work to be known. “I said, as I always have a joke known as ‘Pilate’, let me become a priest today, I still don’t think I was a priest, I was a bishop because I was wearing a hat. I ended by saying let me be a priest, then let it be a channel of my thoughts to make people laugh.”

‘Pilate’ said that he was not joking “in order to mock the Catholic Church, I did it to please people” and “I don’t usually do it”.

He said that after that Mass, he joked with the soldiers, and later appeared in other activities.

This young man said that what was said by Bishop Mbonyintege he understood well, and that he immediately decided to leave it completely.

He also said that there was another Missa he had planned that he would show in Gen-Z Comedy where ‘I would pray to the Pilate Priests’.

“I’m an expert and I do a lot of other things, but I’m not going to work on the Catholic Church and things about Religion and I’m not going to do it again,” he said.

Pilate apologized to Bishop Mbonyintege and the Catholic Church in general. He said, “I apologize, Bishop, bear with me, I was just making fun of people. I would continue to forgive the members of the Catholic Church in Rwanda and everyone else, but it will not happen again.”

The young man said that he usually prays in the ADEPR Church but “I grew up in the Catholic Church and studied in their institutions”.

Pilate the jester announced that he would no longer make fun of the Catholic Church or any other religion

Pilate said that when he made fun of the Catholic Mass, he got more than 1,000 comments in four days, praising what he did, but also disapproving of it.