Women, Religion and Leadership in Zimbabwe, Volume 2

Although leadership globally is often associated with men, in reality women have played, and continue to play, significant leadership roles. The ideology of patriarchy has constantly sought to undermine women’s leadership roles in society, while overplaying men’s leadership roles. In this chapter, we examine the role of the churches in promoting African women’s transformative leadership. In the first section of the paper, we outline the major challenges facing the continent. In the second section, we highlight the role of the churches in promoting African women’s transformative leadership in addressing the continent’s holistic development. In the third section, we outline how the churches in Africa can enhance women’s transformative leadership. In conclusion, we argue that churches in Africa remain strategically positioned to promote women’s transformative leadership for holistic development of the continent.

Women leadership remains a critical challenge in almost all the major religions found in Zimbabwe, including Islam. While there is considerable scholarly literature on women and leadership in religions such as Christianity and African Traditional Religion, there is a dearth of research on Muslim women and leadership in Zimbabwe, hence the thrust of this chapter. Using liberal feminism for its theoretical framework, the chapter explores the extent to which Muslim women are involved in Islam’s critical leadership structures. It uses the qualitative approach and the interview method of data collection. The chapter is divided into two parts. The first part investigates the visibility and leadership opportunities for women during the time of Muhammad. The second part explores the same pertaining to Muslim women in Zimbabwe. The chapter contends that in terms of leadership opportunities, Muslim women in Zimbabwe are relegated to the realm of insignificance, except in cases where they lead other women such as the Fatima Zahra Women’s Organisation. However, when it comes to leadership at the mosque and in other major Islamic organizations such as the Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs, women are conspicuously absent. Apart from that, women cannot become sheikhs or imams. The chapter reveals that the selective use of some of the Quranic scriptures, the institution of patriarchy and culture are the cardinal reasons why Muslim women are subjugated. In sync with Zimbabwe’s National Gender Policy, 2017, the study envisions striking a balance between men and women in terms of leadership in Islam. It seeks to demonstrate that although Muslim women participate in leading other women and children, there is need for a robust implementation of gender redress instruments to achieve equity in Islam’s leadership structures where all the influential positions are occupied by men.

The involvement of women in leadership positions is still a contested issue at the global, African and local levels in most churches. Some churches have used selected biblical texts to bar women from assuming any leadership roles, whilst others have allowed them to assume leadership positions but up to a certain level. Since 1980, Zimbabwe has experienced a mixture of both positive and negative developments in the religious experiences of women in relation to their involvement in leadership roles. The Reformed Church in Zimbabwe (RCZ) has been caught up in this phenomenon. It is against that background that this chapter explores the extent to which women participate in leadership positions in the RCZ. This is unpacked through explicating the two unique phases which the aforementioned church has experienced. These are: the pioneering (1891–1983) and the liberal (1984–2020) periods. The chapter makes use of liberal feminism and theological lenses, whilst applying the phenomenological and historical methodologies in exploring women leadership roles in the RCZ. Furthermore, the chapter provides a trajectory of women leadership trends in the RCZ at congregation, presbytery and synod levels. The chapter postulates a positive shift in women’s participation in various leadership positions against the backdrop of the implementations of numerous gender redress instruments aimed at achieving gender equality between women and men in the church’s leadership structures.

As Zimbabwe’s Second Republic casts its eyes on attaining its Vision 2030 which is in sync with the UN’s Agenda 2030, it is of great importance that we assess gender dynamics in the Apostolic Faith Mission in Zimbabwe (AFMZ)’s leadership structures. This study’s vantage point is that although the Zimbabwean government and other regional and international organizations, such as the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the African Union and the United Nations, have policies that advocate for and aim to achieve gender equality in all facets of life, however, faith-based institutions such as the AFMZ have not yet aligned their structures with such policies. Reflecting on the field research conducted in the AFMZ between September 2017 and February 2018 as part of my doctoral studies, this study contends that the AFMZ is still far from achieving gender equality in its governance structures. Although there is vast literature that celebrates the democratic nature of Pentecostalism, it appears there is a gap in assessing the true state of affairs in Pentecostal churches in terms of governance structures. This study therefore seeks to present evidence that the AFMZ leadership is still hierarchically skewed in terms of gender parity. The chapter presents evidence to illustrate how women are marginalized in the AFMZ governance structures despite all the efforts by the Zimbabwean government to achieve gender equality in both state and non-governmental organizations. This is a qualitative study involving interviews and focus group discussions with sixty participants who are members of the AFMZ from Harare, Ruwa, Seke, Domboshava, Marondera, Seke, Chitungwiza and Bulawayo. The focus group discussions and interviews aimed at substantiating the contention that the AFMZ has not taken adequate measures to achieve gender equality. The study’s theoretical framework is African women’s theology which upholds gender equality in African faith communities. The study concludes by advocating for the inclusion of women in all activities of the church, especially in governance structures. This conclusion is informed by the fact that women are capable of contributing positively to the growth of the AFMZ as agents of change.

Like other parts of the world, Southern Africa has been rocked by a crisis of gender-based violence (GBV), resulting in the extreme suffering of women and children at the hands of some men hiding behind certain notions of masculinities. As the African society continues to search for lasting solutions to this crisis, hope can be drawn from religion and culture. In Africa, religion is a way of life and the majority of membership in the numerous religious circles are women. Ironically, when it comes to taking up leadership positions in most religious sectors, women remain in the shadows while men dominate the leadership hierarchies. By the same token, when it comes to the perpetration of GBV, there are more women at the receiving end of GBV as compared to men. The thrust of this chapter is to take stock of some successes and challenges in relation to the goal of stemming the tide of GBV in Zimbabwe. In this light, the chapter outlines several lessons that can be drawn from one of the oldest and widely followed woman-founded African Indigenous Churches, the Guta Ra Jehovha. The chapter discusses how female leadership in the hands of Matenga (Mai Chaza born Theresa Nyamushana) has positively contributed towards the deconstruction of harmful masculinities. It also illustrates how such initiatives have opened inroads towards creating soft masculinities that are more life-giving and positive in gender relations in Zimbabwe. The second section of this chapter discusses why it is important for Zimbabweans to reflect on women’s important contribution in religion. Emphasis is placed on how women’s involvement has contributed towards solving societal challenges through inculcating positive humanity, especially how they are moulding peaceful men. The third section proceeds to present the background of the gender inequity crisis in Zimbabwe using the Guta Ra Jehovha Church as a case study. It discusses how masculinities are defined and constructed as well as articulating the relationship of masculinities constructed in the Guta Ra Jehovha Church to gender relations. The chapter will conclude by presenting an analysis of how female leadership in religion has contributed in formulating soft masculinities, offering a glimmer of hope for the future.

Women have become a very crucial subject of study in dynamic societies like Zimbabwe where multiple gender tasking is common. Their conventional roles in social institutions have drastically changed owing to their changing environmental circumstances. In religious institutions, such as the Zion Christian Church (ZCC), women have mutated into a complex class whose attributes are no longer generalizable for they have confronted the multiple bottlenecks imposed by patriarchal designs to register themselves as critical players in the church despite the subversion by their male counterparts. Cognisant of the fact that the ZCC commands such a huge following in Zimbabwe, especially among the female folk, this chapter seeks to present a historical exposition on the gender dynamics in this church. In terms of theoretical framework, the chapter follows an interdisciplinary approach. It draws insights from the social history approach and intersectionality. The social history approach is a radical approach that writes history from the perception of the ordinary people, paying attention to the peculiarities of time and space while essentializing the experiences of the marginalized, legitimizing them as historical agents (Stearns, 2009). Intersectionality is the complex, cumulative way in which the effects of multiple forms of discrimination (such as racism, sexism and classism) combine, overlap or intersect, especially in the experiences of marginalized individuals or groups (Crenshaw, 1989).

The present chapter explores the rise of women to influential leadership positions in the church. It argues that the church in Zimbabwe has not yet fully embraced women’s leadership. The church for many women comes across as both a liberator and an oppressor. Women’s ministry and contribution is considered secondary and supplementary to that of men. It is ironic that although women dominate the pews in churches, they remain absent from the churches’ power structures. Their contribution to the growth of the church in Zimbabwe cannot be gainsaid. Women are the backbone of the church. In the church, women access power and religious space through the exercise of spiritual healing, evangelism and leadership. Women have not often been offered equal opportunities in church leadership because of cultural and religious biases which promote women’s silence and subordination. African Initiated Churches and Pentecostal Churches have facilitated enlarged avenues for women’s participation and leadership. Nevertheless, women’s participation is circumscribed by cultural, church and biblical controls. The chapter will examine and discuss issues pertaining to female leadership such as their spiritual role, the legal authority of their ministries, the challenges of patriarchy and the empowerment of women. The rise of women leadership is characterized by many challenges. There is no doubt, however, that women’s contribution and leadership can awaken the church in Zimbabwe.

In taking stock of where the nation of Zimbabwe started off during the olden days pertaining the inclusion of women in leadership up to where we are now, more than forty years after independence, one can just but marvel at the various twists and turns that have been encountered between then and now. Utilising the life course approach to human relations along gender lines, this chapter retraces the course of life that has characterised the gendered contours surrounding leadership dynamics in Zimbabwe. The chapter mainly interrogates the various aspirations of Zimbabwean women to take up leadership positions in the church circles where women generally have a dominance in terms of numbers. Given, however, that religion and culture are widely recognised as some of the chief culprits inhibiting women from attaining their aspirations, the chapter calls for a liberating hermeneutic that sets women free from the religio-cultural clamps that barricade them from taking up leadership. Focus here will be on women in Zimbabwe’s mainline churches and African Initiated Churches (AICs). The underlying argument in this chapter is that the biblical interpretation in churches should not be done in such a way that it promotes misogyny, hatred and patriarchally based injustice. Rather, the chapter argues for a liberating hermeneutic which is tailored towards setting women free from the clutches of an androcentric world. Such a hermeneutic is intended to usher in egalitarianism, particularly in gender-related issues, as well as to ignite hope and love for all regardless of gender.

This chapter explores the Zezuru women’s role in the death rites of passage in Zimbabwe. It highlights the concept of Zezuru women’s participatory leadership during death rituals. Specific activities which are the preserve for women are highlighted. These activities reveal that despite the women’s participatory leadership during the death rites of passage, their role is suppressed within the Zezuru culture and it does not seem to have received adequate attention in academic literature. With a particular focus on the plight of the widows during some of the contentious death rites of passage among the Zezuru, the chapter explores the pastoral role the church can play in response to some of the practices which infringe on the widows’ human rights and dignity.