When President Robert Mugabe needs spiritual sustenance, he returns to his birthplace at Kutama Mission, an hour's drive from the capital Harare. There, Zimbabwe's aging liberator-turned-autocrat wanders his pig and maize farm or visits his alma mater, St. Francis Xavier College, an imposing Catholic boys' school that provides instruction for the sons of Zimbabwe's élite. Mugabe trained as a teacher at the mission school, and it remains a sanctuary for him, a place where he can walk freely and think in peace. It was to St. Xavier's that he returned in triumph after winning the 1980 elections that ended white rule....
