The history of St. Ignatius RC Church and the village

According to a few elders in the village who said the same thing about the history of the village “before there were a few family houses settled around the area, not close by, but far apart near to their farms and hunting ground located at the foot of the Kanaku Mountains. That time there was no Church in the area, only for one in Yupukari some distance away in the north of Ariwa, the original name of St. Ignatius Village. Then one day at mass at Yupukari, the priest said to them that two priests will be coming from Georgetown to visit them in Ariwa so they must prepare to meet them there. The people met the priests when they arrived and they asked them if they would like to have a priest, and they said ‘yes’. So after such agreement they build the church at Ariwa, then after the people stopped going to the church at Yupukari and went to the one at Ariwa.  Then after that the church attracted more people to live close by in the area. So like that the village was established and the first touchou Alfred Bruno was elected where he worked along with the priest and the new members who came to make up the new village.”

Such oral history coincides with the following from the Catholic Church’s history in the Rupununi: the history of the Catholic Church in St. Ignatius began in 1909, when Bishop Galton SJ, and Fr Cuthbert Cary-Elwes SJ, came here to establish a mission to the Amerindians of the Runpununi. The spot which was chosen for such was Ariwa (a Macushi word which is a name of a particular fish), which was the original name of the Village located on the right back of the Takatu River just on the Brazilian border.  There the missionaries established a base and dedicated it to the founder of the Jesuits and became known as St. Ignatius mission, a title it still retains today. 

From such history the Amerindian Community, a Macushi village got its new name St Ignatius, established by the Catholic Church, thus making it a more or less Catholic one. St. Ignatius Amerindian Community is located about 15 minutes from Lethem the administrative centre of region nine (9) and has approximately 600 residents.

Reference: Oral version from elders in the village

                    from the book "The Rupununi Mission"