Widows group in Kenya rescues Catholic women from polygamy, ‘wife inheritance’

ACI Africa, Oct 7, 2024 / 14:30 pm

Susan Auma has known little rest since 2001 when her husband died, leaving her with two toddlers. Widowed at just 27, Auma found herself fighting to survive in her matrimonial home where she was surrounded by hostility for refusing to be remarried.

Auma’s tribulations started before the burial of her husband when her brothers-in-law instructed her to surrender her husband’s property. The idea had been carefully crafted to leave Auma and her sons vulnerable and in need of a man to take care of them.

Then came the rituals, starting with shaving her head clean, and the ultimate cleansing, which was to involve “ritual sex” with a stranger and allow herself to enter into a polygamous union.

Auma refused to participate in all the traditions that were laid before her, accepting the wrath of her husband’s relatives instead. They called her stubborn and threw her out of her home. She was left to fight, many years later, for her husband’s parcel of land to be able to secure her son’s future.

Auma’s tribulations are not isolated in western Kenya, specifically among the Luo tribe, where “wife inheritance” is a deeply entrenched tradition requiring a widow to immediately accept another marriage proposal, preferably from her late husband’s male relatives.

Everything, including the unthinkable, is done to leave the widow vulnerable, including destroying her house. The man who offers to build the widow’s house “inherits” her by default. Orphaned children are incited against their mother, forcing her to accept to be inherited. Animosity deepens between sons and their mothers who refuse to be inherited.

This is why many members of St. Monica Widows Group, a support group in Kenya’s Archdiocese of Kisumu, are “alone in the world.” Children are pressured to want nothing to do with their mothers who chose Christianity over tradition.

St. Monica Widows Group was started in 1984 in the areas served by the Archdiocese of Kisumu. At the time of its founding, the situation was dire. According to Father Lawrence Omollo, the group’s chaplain, women who were kicked out of their homes for refusing to be inherited were being taken in by Catholic mission centers.

“Wife inheritance has been a great pastoral challenge in this region,” Omollo told ACI Africa, CNA’s news partner in Africa, in an interview on Oct. 2 at St. Aloysius Gonzaga Ojolla Parish in the Kisumu Archdiocese, where members of the group had just met for Mass.

“St. Monica Widows Group was created as a support group for widows where they found solace in knowing that they were not alone in their rejection by society and in many other challenges they faced,” Omollo explained.

His words echo those of Archbishop Maurice Muhatia Makumba of the Archdiocese of Kisumu, who has admitted that “wife inheritance” has been “a serious” pastoral challenge in Nyanza, a region served by the archdiocese.

The archbishop said the St. Monica Widows Group was started to rescue widows whose only other option was to be “inherited” and become part of a polygamous union.

“Inheritance is a serious challenge. It is a cultural issue but we are overcoming it slowly by slowly because by forming this group of St. Monica Widows, more and more ladies are opting to join this particular group and refuse to be inherited,” he said.

The archbishop explained that for refusing to be inherited, widows in Nyanza “are ostracized by their communities.”

“Some are rejected. Some lose all their inheritance because of that. They have no access to the property left behind by the husbands,” he explained.

Reports have said widowhood is a source of great distress among the Luo of Kenya’s Nyanza region. Their tribulations include endless court battles for property, rejection, and being blamed for any misfortune that befalls their families.

Such was the case for Margaret Omwa, who joined St. Monica Widows Group in 1996 following the death of her husband.

“I passed through a lot,” Omwa told ACI Africa. “My husband died in an accident when we were just building our house. On his death, his relatives roofed a small section of the house and left the rest bare. It was a trap to oblige me to get a man who would complete the entire roofing. None of the people I contacted accepted to complete the roofing.”

“My husband’s relatives then started inciting my children against me, starting with my first son. He totally refused to step inside my house. He wouldn’t eat my food and refused to talk to me. He saw me as an enemy because I had refused to be inherited,” she said.

Her estranged son, who was living with HIV, was also made to believe that it was his mother’s “uncleanliness” that had made him unwell.

“I was blamed for any misfortune that befell the family,” Omwa shared. “Eventually, my late husband’s relatives convinced my son to go and rent himself a house away from me. I am grateful that on his deathbed, he had accepted that he had HIV. We were also on talking terms.”

But Omwa’s relationship with her in-laws never improved, she said, explaining: “They did very bad things to me in an attempt to get me remarried. They held clan meetings with me to decide my punishment. But I kept reminding them that I had made a vow on my husband’s burial day that I only had a place for him in my life, that I didn’t have any space left for another man.”

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“When all their attempts failed, they left alongside my son, swearing never to help me again,” she recalled.

Omollo told ACI Africa that while other people believe in the vow “until death do us part,” the widows of St. Monica say “until death unites us” when their husbands die and refuse to be remarried.

“St. Monica’s Group of Widows are people who want to be true to the sacraments of baptism and matrimony; those who allow nothing to get in the way of partaking in holy Communion — not even tradition,” Omollo said.

“We also have auxiliary members who support the group’s activities and continue being members when their spouses pass on,” he said.

In the Archdiocese of Kisumu, St. Monica’s Widows Group is one of the lay apostolate groups associated with Small Christian Communities (SCCs). The group is also engaging other Catholic dioceses to get to the national level.

“Organization starts at the SCCs because it is at the grassroots that the challenges of these widows are best understood,” Omollo explained.

The activities of the group include prayer and support of the priests with the little that the widows have, Omollo said. “Every November, the widows tend to the graves of deceased priests. They clean the graves, organize holy Mass for them, and hold prayers at the graveyards of departed priests in the archdiocese.”

They also build houses for those among them who have been thrown out by the relatives of their deceased husbands. 

The widows also support orphans who, according to the group’s chairperson, Roselyne Auma, are always left under the care of their elderly grandmothers.

In an attempt to explain the high HIV prevalence in Nyanza, Roselyne Auma, who joined the group in 2002 following her husband’s death, said that widows often remarry unaware that their late husbands infected them with the virus.

Others do not believe that HIV exists and blame the virus-related illnesses on witchcraft, Auma said, adding: “The man who performs ritual sex sleeps with many women since his job is to cleanse the widows. This is one of the leading reasons for the spread of the virus.”

Apart from the care of orphans, members of St. Monica Widows Group bury their own members whom the rest of the society considers unclean even in death. The women do everything, starting with the digging of the grave.

Describing the stigma against those who refuse to get remarried, Susan Auma said: “The moment you decide to follow Christ and reject traditions, you face instant rejection. You are stigmatized and separated from your children. You are considered unclean and unworthy to mingle with anyone including your children.”

She said that even with Christianity, there are people who go to church and still engage in traditional rituals.

Susan Auma said that being together with other widows of St. Monica reduces the loneliness and the pain that one experiences. 

“With all the rejection, it is so easy for one to get depressed. But when we come together and visit each other, everything becomes easier,” she said.

“Priests are the only people we run to with our challenges. Sometimes, we overwhelm them with our issues,” she said.

Responding to the inspiration behind the name St. Monica, Father Omollo told ACI Africa: “The widows here find it easy to relate with St. Monica, who was not only a widow but also African. They put themselves in the position of St. Monica, the mother of St. Augustine.”

“When Augustine became stubborn, his mother became close to priests, asking them to pray for her son. Eventually, Augustine became a priest and a bishop. This is what our widows do in an effort to protect their children from the influence of harmful traditions,” he said.

This article was first published by ACI Africa, CNA's news partner in Africa, and has been adapted for CNA.