Serving and Building: Three Lives Honoured by the Nation
For the first time, the government has honoured three leaders of the Church of the Nazarene – whose life stories are intertwined with the history and development of the nation itself – with Cape Verde’s highest state honours. This gesture – unprecedented in more than a century of the Nazarene denomination’s presence in the archipelago – was no accident: it justly honoured the quiet and persevering work of men who, under different circumstances, gave the Christian faith an expression of freedom, service and dignity.
On 3 July 2026, the President of the Republic, Dr José Maria Neves, pursuant to Presidential Decree No. 17/2026, awarded three of our pastors: Reverends Dr Jorge Manuel da Silva Barros and Emanuel David Simas Araújo with the Volcano Medal, First Class, and Reverend Dr Eugénio Rosa Duarte with the Order of the Dragoeiro, First Degree. Thus was completed the triple honour that elevated these names to the nation’s civic pantheon.
