Despite men being the representative figures for most of its history, the untold secret of Malawian Christianity is that it has been predominantly a women’s movement. A significant part of the untold story has now been told by the late Clara Henderson, a long-serving Canadian mission partner in Malawi.
Clara was adopted by the Mvano, the uniformed women’s organisation of the Presbyterian Blantyre Synod in the south of the country. This allowed her to immerse herself in the life of the people and, importantly, their music. She has told her story in a new book that was launched today: They Rolled Away the Stone: Mvano Women and the Africanization of Christian Music (Mzuzu: Luviri Press, 2026).
Clara discovered something that was well known to Mvano women themselves but that few others had noticed. The women had enacted an Africanization of their Christian faith through music. They received traditional hymns, often from Scotland, and then they transformed them into African rhythms.
Not only that, but they began to dance to their new compositions, sometimes featuring the African tradition of dancing in a circle counterclockwise. Such dance often takes place outdoors and makes a powerful impression. Clara traces how this cultural creativity gave African expression to Christian faith.
Her favourite song was “The Rolled Away the Stone,” which evokes the experience of the women who went to visit the tomb of Jesus and found that the stone had been rolled away. This becomes a powerful metaphor for overcoming difficult situations through the power of the resurrection of Christ. The performance of this song, dance included, was the centrepiece of today’s book launch.
The launch was also significant as the book is the first in a new series being produced by the Hara Research Centre at Zomba Theological University. The aim of the series is to retrieve manuscripts that were not published but should have been. It is off to a flying start.
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