Attending Church in Malawi

July 6, 2009

 On the first Monday that we were here a man came to the porch.  (People don’t knock here.  They just hang out on the porch until you notice them.  If it is dark you might here a very soft “excuse me” outside the window.  The four of us sit and look around and say, “who said that?”  and “where did that come from?”  Now we know.)  Actually, in Chechewa they say “odi!” which means “is anyone home” and we would respond “lowani” which is “welcome”.  Anyway, there was this man on the porch so I said to Michael Patrick, “There is someone here.”  He went out to speak with him.  After a few minutes he came in and says, “He wants to speak with you.”  Oh no, I thought.  Here we go.  People are going to be knocking on our door all the time asking for money or trying to sell us something.”  I went out and met Frank.  He has a last name and I have it written down somewhere but can’t find it.  Frank is one of the gentlest and soft spoken men I have ever met.  It turns out that Frank had come by to visit Michael Patrick who had told him that we were from Alaska.  He had no idea that we were here.  He is friends with Tom and Ruth and also corresponds with someone at St. Mary’s Episcopal church back in Anchorage and wanted me to take a letter to that person.  Over tea and toast we also learned that he is a teacher at the private catholic school down the road (don’t try to equate it to a private catholic school back home) and that he is a deacon of the Anglican church in his village, St. Michael’s and All Angels Church.  He invited us to attend church the next Sunday, but we needed to come by sometime so he could show us how to find it.  We told him that we would stop by his school on the way to MCV the next day.  (The school is probably about 2 ½ miles from our house.)  The school is good sized and we had no idea how to find him, but as soon as we pulled up he walked out of the classroom.  He had been waiting on us.  First, he wanted us to meet his class.  (By this time we were used to standing in front of a large group of Malawians and shouted out a loud greeting followed by giggles and laughter which is what happened there again.)  He teaches a 4^th grade class speaking both English and Chechawa.  (Frank’s English is very, very good plus he speaks so slowly that we understand everything he says.)  He then left his class to take us to the church.  He just LEFT his 4^th grade class sitting there and told them to sit there until he came back.  And they did! 

 

He gave us a quick tour of the church and we promised that we would see him on Sunday.  (In the meantime, I met the orphan that lives with him, Charity, at MCV in one of Jess’s classes and his wife, Kate, works at the nursery at Open Arms.)  It often feels like a village around here. 

 

We arrived at the church promptly at 9:00 when services begin.  Of course, the service starts on African time so we were some of the first to arrive.  The church is one room, a long rectangle, with wooden pews along the side but with a much wider central aisle than we tend to have.  We sat down on the wrong bench.  Some of the benches were solid and some were slatted.  We got a slatted one which means that skinny Azungu butts go right through and they are quite uncomfortable.  Annie and I also sat down on the wrong bench because there is a women’s side and a men’s side.  Oh well, we share out traditions.  We all needed to share the book in which the liturgy was written in both Chechewa and English.  The church is decorated with African paintings of Christ in front and the stations of the cross along the side walls. 

 

Gradually more and more people filtered in until 15 or 20 minutes into the service, it was absolutely full.  It was amazing to me to see that all of the children sit together and that all of them are well behaved, down to the age of 2 or so.  Children of 5 or 6 carried siblings of 2 who weight wise, really aren’t that much smaller than them. 

 

The service was filled with lots and lots of music.  There was hymn singing but also four different choirs, each of which sang multiple different songs.  There were two women’s choirs, one that appeared to be young people and then teenagers down to children.  The last two choirs were particularly amazing and both of them included drums and other percussion.  The harmony was so beautiful and I never thought that the acoustics would be see wonderful in a building with a tin roof.  I am hoping that I might be able to record some of their singing onto Garageband if we find a time to go back.

 

The service lasted three hours!  I was never bored and my children never complained once.  Most of the service was singing and the liturgy for the Eucharist.  The deacon who gave the service translated into English the gist of the sermon.  Here’s something really funny.  At one point in the service we were asked if we had any remarks and Mark stood up and gave a very heartfelt little speech and then at another part of the service which involved the married women dancing up at the front of the church, I joined in.  This made everyone very happy.  I was happy , too.  It will definitely be one of the most memorable services of my life and we hope to visit again before we leave.