KAMPALA; President Yoweri Museveni’s daughter, Pastor Patience Rwabwogo, has been consecrated as an Episcopal Bishop, marking a significant new chapter in her two-decade journey in Christian ministry and adding a prominent female voice to Uganda’s Pentecostal and evangelical leadership.

Rwabwogo, the founder and lead pastor of Covenant Nations Church (CNC), was consecrated on Sunday, August 23, 2026, during a ceremony held at the church’s Covenant Hill campus in Maya, Wakiso District.

The ceremony was presided over by renowned American evangelist Bishop Dr LaDonna C. Osborn, with senior Christian leaders including Pastor Enoch Adejare Adeboye of Nigeria’s Redeemed Christian Church of God and Archbishop Moses Odongo of the Pentecostal Churches in Uganda among those involved in the service.

President Museveni and First Lady Janet Museveni attended the ceremony, alongside Vice President Jessica Alupo, government officials, religious leaders and other invited guests.

The consecration coincided with the 20th anniversary of Covenant Nations Church, which Rwabwogo founded nearly two decades ago as a small house fellowship in Luzira, Kampala. The ministry has since grown into a wider Christian movement with a focus on biblical teaching, discipleship, leadership development, youth ministry and evangelism.

Rwabwogo has described her elevation not as a pursuit of status, but as a call to greater responsibility.

“I never sought this office,” she said ahead of the consecration, describing the move as a transition into “greater responsibility, deeper consecration and a higher level of service.”

Her journey into ministry, according to accounts published ahead of the ceremony, began with her Christian faith as a child. She has said she gave her life to Jesus at the age of 11 and was deeply influenced by her family’s Christian background.

Her early spiritual journey was also connected to the late American evangelist Dr Daisy Washburn Osborn, who gave Rwabwogo her first Bible. Daisy Osborn and her husband, the late evangelist T.L. Osborn, had longstanding links to Uganda dating back to their evangelistic campaigns in the country in the 1980s.

Despite her strong Christian background, Rwabwogo has said that accepting a call into pastoral ministry was not immediate.

“I struggled for years just to accept God's call into pastoral ministry,” she recalled in an interview published by New Vision.

That calling eventually led to the establishment of Covenant Nations Church, which began with family members and friends gathering for prayer, worship and Bible study.

Two decades later, the church has expanded its ministry beyond its original congregation, placing particular emphasis on young people, leadership and what Rwabwogo describes as the practical transformation of society through Christian values.

Her elevation also comes amid a longstanding debate over the place of women in Uganda's churches.

Women have played significant roles in Christian ministry for decades, including as evangelists, pastors, priests, theologians and church administrators. Yet the highest levels of ecclesiastical leadership have remained largely male-dominated.

The Church of Uganda began ordaining women to the diaconate in the 1970s and to the priesthood in the 1980s, but the move into episcopal leadership has proved considerably more difficult.

That history gives Rwabwogo's elevation significance beyond her family name.

Her consecration comes at a moment when questions around women's leadership, authority and representation in Uganda's religious institutions remain unresolved.

For supporters, her elevation demonstrates that women can occupy senior positions of spiritual authority and influence. For the wider Christian community, it also raises questions about how different denominations understand episcopal leadership and the role of women in the church.

The ceremony was also deeply personal for the Museveni family.

President Museveni has publicly praised his daughter's commitment to preaching, saying in 2024 that he was grateful to see her following in his footsteps in preaching the gospel and developing that talent.

Speaking at the consecration on Sunday, Museveni also reflected on his daughter's knowledge of scripture, saying that despite his own long engagement with Bible study, her depth of scriptural scholarship had surprised him.

For Rwabwogo, however, the day was framed less as a family achievement and more as a spiritual responsibility.

As Covenant Nations Church marked 20 years since its beginnings in a house fellowship, her consecration effectively opened another chapter in the ministry's history, and placed a Ugandan woman at the centre of a growing conversation about women, faith and leadership.