After ten days in the Diocese of Northern Malawi, we spent a day transitioning to the southern realms of the country, where we were guests of the Anglican Diocese of Upper Shire. Nine of us boarded our six passenger bus for the supposed eight hour jaunt. I say ‘supposed’ because half way to Zomba, the city to which we were ultimately going, we reached a point where our driver discerned that a bridge was out! So we had to take a slight eight hour detour, which made our trip from north to south a scant sixteen hours!
As we rode along and played who knows how many games of 20 Questions, I couldn’t help but imagine the first Christian missionaries from the nineteenth century in central Africa, all of whom were young Anglican seminarians from Cambridge, Durham, and Oxford; they worked under the banner of Universities' Mission to Central Africa (UMCA). They travelled not in vans, but on foot, of course, carrying with them only the most basic necessities. Many of them died from malaria and a whole host of other diseases.
Despite the zeal and orginisation of the UMCA, their first mission to Malawi, in the words of their first bishop, Charles McKenzie, was ‘an utter failure’, for most of the students died either from malaria or were killed by opposing tribal leaders. So I found it hard to complain about our long drive. We stand indebted to them, for they singlehandedly spread Christianity to central Africa, and they successfully stopped the slave trade in the region, to boot. And just like us, they were young seminarians with a love of God and an earnest desire to see His kingdom increase here and now. Dear ones, never underestimate what God may be calling you to accomplish for His glory.
We did, however, arrive safely once more. The Spirit was with us everywhere we went; not one time did we fear for our safety or general well-being. We were indebted, moreover, to our team of intercessors back stateside, too. We felt their prayers each day, and we could not have done this without their hard work and tender love.
Zomba, in my humble estimation, is Malawi’s historic heart. It played host to the capital for most of the twentieth century, replete with its heavy expat population and legacy, and it’s the educational heart of the country, too. Nine out of the nation’s ten colleges are in central Zomba, including the Anglican variant, Leonard Kamungu Theological College, where we worshipped, studied, and lectured. Kamungu College is also the seminary where Fr. Andrew Sumani, a recent graduate of Nashotah House, is the resident lecturer in Old Testament studies and Hebrew.
Though I’d never been to Kamungu College, I felt as if I’d been there all along. I’m not talking once more about hospitality in general. No, I mean there is something warm and beautiful about encountering the faith, that is, the Universal faith of the Church on another continent. Forgive me for stating the obvious, but we share the same Lord, the same holy Sacraments, the same essential shape of the liturgy, and, yes, even the same struggles as seminarians seeking to serve God in His holy Catholic Church. To experience all of this at once – some fifteen thousand miles from home – was a gift from God.
Just like life at Nashotah, we began our days with chapel, breakfast, and then classes, except the tables were literally turned: we were the guest lecturers! I had been asked to lecture in two sections of Church History. With the juniors, I applied the Canon of St. Vincent of Lerins to modern theological questions, hoping to establish a paradigm of sorts. Whether I was successful is anyone’s guess. I certainly provoked a lively discussion. And in the second section, we spent most of our time trying to figure out the Anabaptist uprisings in the sixteenth century. The overreaching rubric under which we placed our time together was really one of shared ministry and relationship building between our seminary and theirs. Our week of teaching and sharing was one I shall hold near to my heart forever.
In the afternoons after class, we visited a number of sites in the diocese, several of which stand out.
In addition to being a son of Nashotah House, Fr. Sumani is also the founder and convener of St. George’s HIV/AIDS Ministry (SAGHAM), which, though it started out just to minister to HIV patients, has now expanded to include hundreds of orphans and elderly widows. I only know one way to describe their work: they are completely overwhelmed, underpaid, and understaffed. Yet they are full of the Holy Spirit and radically committed to caring for those in their diocese who’ve been robbed of so much joy.
Though we visited many homes, I distinctly recall visiting Sarina’s hut. She lives in the countryside just a few kilometres from the city centre, and, as you might suspect in a poor country like Malawi, Sarina has a dirt floor, no windows, no door, and only a crude plastic apparatus to partially act as a roof. When the rainy season comes, she huddles with her two children in one corner of the hut to escape the wind and rain. She is thirty-five, single, and has two young children, a handsome boy and a beautiful girl. Sarina has AIDS and will die soon. Sarina isn’t alone; millions of people in Malawi are living in these conditions, and that’s where Fr. Sumani’s ministry steps in. In the Diocese of Upper Shire alone, perhaps as many as one-third of the parishioners are HIV positive.
Instead of setting up full-fledged hospitals, which would require quite an initial investment and an expansive staff, the volunteers at SAGHAM are sent out – on foot in most cases – to care for their beneficiaries. And they neither stop nor start with basic needs. SAGHAM serves the whole person – the physical, emotional, and, above all, the spiritual needs of the diocese. Instead of giving Sarina advice or admonishment appropriate to her situation, SAGHAM visits her, cries with her, gets her children to school and back, gets them to Mass on Sundays, and makes sure that Sarina can see God’s love. ‘Why care for her outer circumstances without soothing her soul first’ is the rubric under which Fr. Andrew places this vital ministry. When we sat on her front porch with her, one of Fr. Sumani’s volunteers held Sarina’s hand and gently massaged it while we prayed and talked. The love that SAGHAM demonstrates is crucial to the proclamation of the gospel in central Africa.
Rest assured that Christ is alive and well in Malawi. In the West we have much to learn – not so much from or how to address their worldly poverty – but what we can gain from their spiritual richness.
From My Journal
What’s God shown me about Himself?
God’s business is transformation, period. Being open to the Holy Spirit is crucial to a healthy Christian life.
What’s God shown me about myself?
God has shown me that I’m an ingrate. I suspect I’m not alone.
What’s been challenging?
The sheer volume of extreme poverty that we’ve encountered is hard to ingest. Being with the bishop in the North somewhat shielded us from this poignant reality of Malawian life. I’ve seen so many bare feet and swollen tummies. I’m not really sure what to do.
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