Christian Couples Coping with Childlessness

Narratives from Machame, Kilimanjaro

Vahakangas

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2009
• eBook ISBN: 9781498275200
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Children are the focus of marriage in African cultures. Marriage is considered full and functional only if the couple has children--in many cultures preferably a boy. Becoming a parent also contributes to one's full adulthood in the sense that childlessness blocks ascent towards full personal dignity as an adult person in the community. As a result, childlessness is often a major disaster for both of the spouses. It has social, economical, and personal consequences, quite often including divorce.This book explores in depth how childlessness is perceived, dealt with, and coped with in two Christian communities in Machame on the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro. Childlessness is approached through narratives of the spouses concerned and the members of their communities. Their stories reveal pain and courage, brokenness and strength, faithfulness and betrayal. Christianity presents itself in an ambiguous light, on one hand, pressuring spouses to keep up facades supporting oppressive structures. On the other hand, Christian faith provides childless couples with personal hope in the afterlife that the African traditional culture offers only to those with children.This study proves that childlessness is not only a personal but also a communal problem. Childlessness and the fear of having no children contribute to family structures and sexual behavior. In this way, they have a considerable impact on the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa. However, this study reveals that the attitudes and practices towards marriage and children need not be petrified, but rather that traditions can, and do, change.

1

Research Procedure

The Field Research Communities

My goal was to find two parishes that were willing to accept my research proposal; one parish located close to Moshi town and a second that would be in a village area quite far from the influence of Moshi. I did not want to conduct my research in the center of the regional because many people come there from different parts of Kilimanjaro and some from outside the region altogether. Both of the chosen areas should preferably be on the same side of Moshi and to have cultural connections to each other.

I concentrated on the Machame cultural area in western Kilimanjaro. In the nineteenth and early twentieth century, the Machame area was a mission field of the German Leipzig Mission. The first missionaries who came to this area concentrated on the spiritual growth of the Christians.1 They did not conduct wide anthropological studies, as their colleague Bruno Gutmann, of the same mission, did in the Old Moshi area. Gutmann was criticized by his fellow missionaries for being too bound to the social structures of the Chagga. The others, for example, the head of Leipzig Mission in Kilimanjaro, Johannes Raum, stressed the teaching and baptizing of the Chagga people.2 The traditional practices, for example, female circumcision and ancestral sacrifices, seem to have been less common in the Machame area than in other parts of Kilimanjaro.3 However, the traditional practices have influenced the life of the Chagga of Machame as well.

Two parishes in the eastern Hai District of the Northern Diocese, which is located on the southwestern slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro, were chosen to be the location of research. Both of these parishes belong to Nkwarungo, the main area of the old Machame kingdom and culture. The vernacular Kimachame and Machame traditions and background unite these two parishes. The difference between these parishes is that most of the parishioners in the rural parish were born in the area of the parish and truly belong to the Machame culture, whereas the area of the urban parish is more of a mixture of people from different places and backgrounds. These parishes will hereafter be referred to as the rural and the urban parish. For the sake of the anonymity of the interviewees, the parishes names and locations are withheld.

The population census of 1988 gives interesting figures on the population in northern and southern Machame. In southern Machame, where the urban parish is situated, the ratio of males to females is almost equal; there are only a few more men than women. In northern Machame, where the rural parish is, the male-female ratio is quite uneven, with a greater number of females than males.4 This difference is attention grabbing given that the distance between these two parishes is barely ten kilometers. The main reason for the uneven number of males and females on the upper slopes of Kilimanjaro is that men have migrated to towns but most of the women have stayed in the villages.

The rural parish is located on the higher slopes of the mountain and consists of several villages. There are two churches in the parish and several other places of prayer. Most of the inhabitants in the area are Lutheran Christians, while only a couple of families are Muslims and a few others attend the Pentecostal churches on the lower slopes. The parishioners of the rural parish are mainly Chagga, born in Machame. Some people come from other parts of Tanzania; most of them are young paid workers on the Machame farms. Others who come from other ethnic backgrounds are married to Machame spouses. The main income of the parishioners comes from farming and cattle keeping. The higher slopes of Machame are famous for milk production. Parishioners in the rural parish are hardworking people who rest only on Sundays. During Sunday worship, the churches in the rural parish are full and the attendance consists of the old, middle-aged, and children. Most of the young people are either in schools or have migrated to towns in search of work. The scarcity of land does not offer employment to all the children in large families.

The urban parish is located on the lowland plain. The area is actually only semi-urban, into which most people have moved during the last twenty or thirty years. Before the 1960s, this area was a big field through which people traveled from the mountain to cultivate the land during the rainy seasons. Slowly, some members of the family moved permanently into these villages closer to Moshi town. The urban parishioners consist of people of different occupations. Many are small-scale farmers, but in addition many are involved in various types of business, as the closeness of Moshi town increases the opportunities to do business.

Most people have moved to the urban parish from different parts of Machame, not only from Nkwarungo. Some people are from other parts of Kilimanjaro and from other ethnic groups. The Lutherans in this area are mostly from Machame, while the Roman Catholic population is mostly from the Kibosho area, the neighboring kingdom of Machame towards the east. In the Kilimanjaro area, the connection between ethnic and language identity and religious denomination membership can be clearly seen. Ethnic identity is not a clear denominational division in that all Chaggas are Lutherans or even Christians, but most people from Kilema, Kibosho, and Rombo are Roman Catholics and most people from Machame, Marangu, and Mwika are Lutherans. Language identity in different parts of Kilimanjaro is different; the various Chagga dialects are almost different languages. Kimachame is closer to Kimeru, a vernacular that is spoken among the Meru people, than it is to the Kichagga of Mwika of eastern Kilimanjaro.

I...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Preface
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Research Procedure
• Chapter 2: Narrative of a Committed Union
• Chapter 3: Narrative of Desertion
• Chapter 4: Two Narratives of Polygyny
• Chapter 5: Life of Childless Couples in Machame
• Chapter 6: Sense of Coherence as Wholeness
• Conclusion
• Appendix A: Sample Interview Questions
• Appendix B: Direct Quotations in Swahili
• Glossary
• Bibliography