Abstract
Ethnicity, tribalism and xenophobia could be found inside and outside church walls. Ethnic and racist behaviours in human beings are natural, learned and nurtured within societies around the world. However, ethnic identity and relations exist whether the ethnic groups are competing or not. The first challenge of the early church in the New Testament Church was to overcome ethnicity and hostile divisions between Jews and Gentles. The New Testament Church’s principles of open plural government overcame the phenomenon. The contemporary church is in dilemma to understand its archaic church polity and order in her own challenging context today.
Highlights
This article discusses reasons for the existence of ethnicity and ethnic divisions in the structures of the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian (CCAP), Synods of Livingstonia, Blantyre and Nkhoma in Malawi
The system of church government adopted by the CCAP Synods for dividing areas of operation according to ethnicity was corrupted politically motivated
Political power and authority were vested in one person, thereby enhancing ethnic allegiance to a group of ruling class. Both the Church of Central Africa, Presbyterian (CCAP) and the Government of Malawi adopted the highly centralized hierarchical political and administrative system developed by Colonial European masters from the 19th Century (Zeze 2014:175f)
Summary
This article discusses reasons for the existence of ethnicity and ethnic divisions in the structures of the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian (CCAP), Synods of Livingstonia, Blantyre and Nkhoma in Malawi. In 1968, the President decided that there would be only one African language in official use in MalawiChinyanja renamed Chichewa and that all ethnic languages such as Chiyangonde, Nyachusa, Tonga, Yao, Lomwe, Sena, including Chitumbuka would be disallowed in government offices, schools, the Press and radio. Later it was clarified as a way of fostering communication and national unity, the extent to which it entailed a new mythology of Malawi’s cultural identity soon became apparent. Dr Banda celebrated with joy Chewa language and culture while vilifying Northerners and ignoring Southerners (Kaspin 1995:595-620)
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