Mozambique Blog 6

One of the more animated moments of the synod meeting (now two weeks ago) came when the ministries committee presented their report. That the report had not reached delegates on time did not get things off to a good start – but the real excitement came with a throw-away line in the next-to-last paragraph to the effect that pastors’ wives would no longer be accepted for training for ministry.

The reasons offered for this seemingly harsh decision were pragmatic. The IPM is a small church, and it is difficult to place husband and wife teams so as to provide a real pastoral opportunity for both. But if one translator’s account of the quite short debate was accurate, there were some less nuanced things being said from the floor: are some women only looking to train because their friends have done so? A dissenting elder statesman of the church told me later that the right way would have been to agree to deal with each case on its merits, but synod seemed to want to lay the law down in a more definite and excluding manner.

I know of three married couples in the IPM ministry – out of some 50 or 60 working ministers. So the decision to go with the report seems a strange way to build up the ministry that the Church clearly needs if it is to expand as it hopes. However, one delegate who spoke to one of our guest colleagues assured him that the decision was what the women really wanted. A male voice, needless to say, and commenting on a debate where no women were heard. Despite the preponderance of women in the Sunday congregations, it’s men who make the decisions; and looking at the list of members of the Synod Council, it’s ordained men at that. I wonder who the ministries committee consulted as they drew up their report?

Over the past week I have been busy at Khovo setting up English lessons – and wishing I had more experience at this sort of thing. My intention of focusing on conversation has been hijacked by my students’ common desire to have everything written down: I come back from each lesson covered in chalk dust…. Education is taken extremely seriously in this country, and it seems that methods are pretty traditional. I hadn’t envisaged students sitting in rows at desks in front of a blackboard – but that’s how the little classroom is set out, and there’s little to be done about it.

In these mixed ability groups, it’s no surprise that the students with the better grounding in English are generally male. But the keenness and enthusiasm that some of the women, both young and older, have for learning are so striking, that I cannot believe that the Church will be able to hold them all back as it seems sometimes still to be doing.

One of the most vocal members of the class told us all the other afternoon “I have a dream to go to England and study at university”. She could not believe me when I told her how many universities there are in England, compared with the three state institutions in Mozambique – though there are several private ones as well. Needless to say, when I told her how much it costs students to go to university she began to revise her dream. But I think she and her colleagues will still have dreams, and show a personal determination to make things change. As that happens, I just hope that the Church does not get left behind.

John Durell