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Hannah Wangeci Kinoti
Born	1941 August 1st Nyeri County, Kenya
Died	2001 April 30th
Occupation	Lecturer
Academic background
Education	Alliance Girls High School, Makerere College School, College of the University of East Africa
Alma mater	College of the University of East Africa
Academic work
Discipline	Educationist, Religious Studies Scholar, Theologian
Institutions	University of Nairobi

Hannah Wangeci Kinoti

Biography

Hannah Kinoti was born in Nyeri District (now Nyeri County) in August 1941. Her parents, Ruben and Ruth Gathii, were among the first natives of the district to convert to Christianity.

Personal Life

Hannah Kinoti grew up as a member of her parents’ church, which later became the Presbyterian Church of East Africa, but it was when she was 15 years old, she committed her life to Christ. As a youth, she was active in evangelism and later on she was accredited as a lay preacher in the Methodist Church in Kenya (her husband’s denomination) and for many years she also served as superintendent of the Sunday School at the Lavington United Church in Nairobi (her family church). In addition, she was called upon to speak on a variety of topics of a spiritual, moral or social nature in Nairobi and further afield. An English friend once described Hannah as a genuine African Christian woman and truly that is who she was. A multi-talented woman, she had a very happy married and family life.  

Hannah Kinoti was educated at Alliance Girls High School, Makerere College School in Kampala where she did the Cambridge Advanced Level School Certificate, and Makerere College which was at the time a college of the University of East Africa. In 1966 she graduated with an honors Bachelor of Arts degree in Religious Studies and English and then went on to do a Graduate Diploma in Teacher Education at the same George university.  After graduating as a teacher, she taught (Bible knowledge, English, divinity, literature) at Kenya High School for five years.

Career

She then secured an appointment as a tutorial fellow at the University of Nairobi where she did her Ph.D. in the Department of Religious Studies and Philosophy as a part-time student. In the mid-1990s a post-doctoral fellowship enabled her to spend six months at the Department of Social Medicine, Harvard University Medical School in Boston, USA, learning methods for research in health and behaviour.

At the University of Nairobi Hannah Kinoti rose through the academic ranks and she was an Associate Professor in the Department of Religious Studies and Philosophy at the time of her sudden death in 2001. She had served as the Chairman (she didn’t see any need to change the title) of the department for the maximum term of six years. In addition to her university duties, she at different times served as (i) a member of the Board of Governors of Limuru (now Jumuia) Conference Centre, (ii) a member of the Board of Governors, St. Andrew’s School, Turi, (iii) a member of the Board of Governors of  St. Pauls Theological College Limuru (now St Pauls University), (iv) a member of the Board of Directors of CORAT (Christian Organizations Research Advisory Trust), and (v) Chairman, Joint Urban Community  Improvement Programme/Scholarship Committee, a department of the National Christian Council of Kenya, (v) a member of the editorial board/consultant editor of Wajibu Journal of Social and Religious Concern.    

Hannah Kinoti loved teaching, including supervising research by students, which ranged from undergraduate to master's and doctoral research projects. She taught or supervised students at the University of Nairobi as well as others at the Jesuit School of Theology, Hekima College, where she was an adjunct lecturer and Kenyatta University. At the same time, she carried on a fruitful scholarly life as shown by the selection of her publications below.  She was an active member of several professional organizations, namely Eastern Africa Ecumenical Symposium, Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians Kenyan Chapter, the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians Kenyan Chapter, Association of Theological Institutions in Eastern Africa, and the World Conference of Associations of Theological Institutions.

Selected Works

Kinoti, H.W. (2013). Growing Old in Africa: New Challenges for the Church. In Waruta, D. W. and Kinoti, H.W. (Eds). Pastoral care in African Christianity: Challenging essays in pastoral theology. Acton Publications, Nairobi, 191-218.

Kinoti, H. W. (2010). African ethics: Gĩkũyũ traditional morality. CUEA Press, Nairobi.

Kinoti, H.W. (2003). Christology in the East African Revival movement. In Mugambi, J. K., & Magesa, L. (Eds). Jesus in African Christianity: experimentation and diversity in African christology. Acton, Publishers, Nairobi, 60-79.

Kinoti, H. W. (1999). “African morality: Past and present.” In Moral and Ethical Issues in African Christianity: Exploratory Essays in Moral Theology, 2nd ed., edited by J. N. K. Mugambi and Anne Nasimiyu-Wasike, 73–82. Nairobi: Acton Publishers.

Kinoti, H.W. (1998). Proverbs in African Spirituality. In Getui, M. N. (Ed). Theological method and aspects of worship in African Christianity. Acton Publishers, Nairobi, 55-78.

Kinoti, H.W. (1997). Well-being in African Society and the Bible. In Waliggo, J. M., & Kinoti, H. W. (Eds). The Bible in African Christianity: Essays in Biblical Theology. Acton Publishers, Nairobi, 112-143.

Kinoti, H.W. (1997). The Church in the Reconstruction of our Moral Self. In Mugambi, J. N. K. (Ed). The church and reconstruction of Africa: Theological considerations. All Africa Conference of Churches, 115-128.

Kinoti, H.W. (1992). African Morality: Past and Present. in J. N. Mugambi, & N. Wasike, Moral and Ethical issues in African Christianity.  Nairobi: Initiatives, 73-82.

Oduyoye has written four books and more than eighty articles focusing on Christian theology from a feminist and African perspective.

African Women

Mercy Amba Eudziwa Oduyoye was born October 21, 1934, in Brong Asante Village (Chidilli, 12) the eldest of nine children of Charles Kwaw Yamoah and Mercy Yaa Dakwaa Yamoah. Her family was from the Akan ethnic group. Her father, an ordained Methodist minister and teacher eventually became the third President of the Conference Methodist Church in Ghana from 1973-1977 (Fiedler, Mercy, Her mother graduated from Wesley Girls School and was an activist and leader in her own right for the liberation of women and children in the church. (Soujourners Magazine, 24)She states that she lives out of her "Christianized Akan background." (Russell, 36) Amba means born on Saturday and Eudziwa after my grandfather, Kodwo Ewudzi. (Russell, 38)

Oredein, Oluwatomisin. "GUARD YOUR CIRCLE SISTERS." Sojourners Magazine, 12, 2020, 22-27, http://libproxy.tulane.edu:2048/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/magazines/guard-your-circle-sisters/docview/2511382355/se-2.

Russell, Letty M. Inheriting Our Mothers’ Gardens Feminist Theology in Third World Perspective. 1st ed. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1988. ISBN 066425019X; ISBN 978-0664250195

Fiedler, Rachel NyaGondwe. “Mercy Amba Oduyoye as Mother and Leader of the Circle (1989 - 1996).” A History of the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians 1989-2007, Mzuni Press, 2017, pp. 10–40. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvh8r2j5.4. Accessed 6 Mar. 2023.

Ogunbiyi, David Oluwabukunmi African Theologians and Christian Theology: The Contributions of Selected African Theologians and Scholars to African Christian Theology in Nigeria: Mercy Oduyoye. (ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0BQZ7JHWD)

https://www.biola.edu/talbot/ce20/database/mercy-amba-oduyoye

Oduyoye, M. A. (2004). Beads and strands: Reflections of an African woman on Christianity in Africa. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books. p. xii; Amoah, p. xx).

Chidili, Bartholomew Udealo, "The vision of Mercy Amba Oduyoye an African feminist theologian and educator: Pedagogy of human dignity" (2003). ETD Collection for Fordham University. AAI3081402.

https://research.library.fordham.edu/dissertations/AAI3081402

Oduyoye, M. A. (1990). Who will roll the stone away? The ecumenical decade of the churches in solidarity with women. Geneva, Switzerland: World Council of Churches.

Renaud, Miriam., & Schweiker,William.  eds. ‎2020. Multi-Religious Perspectives on a Global Ethic: In Search of a Common Morality.  New York:  Routledge:  ISBN 9780367640026

Hinga, Teresia M. “African Feminist Theologies, the Global Village, and the Imperative of Solidarity across Borders: The Case of the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians.” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, vol. 18, no. 1, 2002, pp. 79–86. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25002427. Accessed 6 Mar. 2023. Book is ISBN 9781626982499

Education:

Oduyoye attended a Methodist primary school in her Brong village (Chidili 14

From 1953-1954 she attended the Teacher’s Training College at Kumasi College of Technology, which is now the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi. This is where she completed a Post-Secondary Certificate of Education, called Teachers Certificate A, from the Ministry of Education Ghana. From 1954-1959 she taught at Asawase Methodist Girls Middle School near Kusami. https://www.biola.edu/talbot/ce20/database/mercy-amba-oduyoye

Two mentors, Noel Q. King, a church history professor at the University of Ghana, and E. Bolaji Idowu encouraged her to pursue theology because the enterprise of theology needed women's voices. (Soujourner, 24) Oduyoye attended University College of Ghana, Legon between 1959 and 1963 and, in 1963, she became the first women at the University of Ghana to graduate with graduate with the Bachelor of Arts (Honours) degree in the Study of Religion. Until 1963 the University of Ghana, Legon was a college of the University of London. (Chidili, 14,15)

In 1964, Oduyoye graduated from the University of Cambridge, UK with a Bachelors of Art (Honours) degree in theology focusing on Tripos Part III, Dogmatics (1963-1965). She went on to receive a Master of Arts (Honours) degree in theology from the same university in 1969 https://www.biola.edu/talbot/ce20/database/mercy-amba-oduyoye Rather than teaching at the University, she return to Ghana and taught two years at Wesley Girls' High School in Cape Coast, Ghana. (Soujourner, 24)

Work

From 1967 - 1970 Oduyoye was the Youth Education Secretary in the World Council of Church. She was also thetreasurer of the Student Christian Federation of Ghana. She met her husband during this period and married in 1968 and both lived in Geneva until 1970. (Chidili, 17) Adedoyin Modupe Oduyoye was a Yale graduate, who was the General Secretary of the Students Christian Movement (SCM) of which Mercy was also a member. (Fiedler, 18-20) She resigned from the WCC in Geneva in 1970 and moved to Nigeria where she took a job as Youth Secretary of the All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC) from 1970 - 1973 (Fiedler, 18-20) https://www.biola.edu/talbot/ce20/database/mercy-amba-oduyoye She left the AACC when all employees were required to live in Nairobi and she began teaching first in a high school and later in college. After a short stint teaching in a boys school, she joined the faculty at the University of In 1975 she join the Religious Studies Department at the University of Ibadan. While a member of the The Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians (EATWOT), she created the Commission on Theology from Third World Women's Perspective. She also participated in a four-year study (1978-1981) titled the “Community of Women and Men in Church and Society.” This study uncovered inequalities in Church communities as well as the sexism, racism and classism in the society as a whole. In 1987 she became the Deputy Secretary of the World Council of Churches, the first African to take this position. She remained in this position until 1994. (Oduyoye, 1990, Stone) (Chidili, 17). While at the WCC, Oduoyoe launched the "Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women," 1988 - 1998, in solidarity with the 1985 U.N. Conference of Women in Nairobi. She retired from the WCC in 1994. She founded the “Institute of African Women In Religions and Culture" in 1999 after four years of fundraising globally and promoting the idea for the institute. Today she heads this Institute. (Chidili, 18, )

The Circle

Dr. Oduyoye, from her position as deputy secretary of the World Council of Churches, convened and created the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians in 1989 at Trinity College in Accra, Ghana. Oduyoye had also launch the WCCs "Decade of Churches in Solidarity with Women" (1988 - 1998) and the United Nations had concluded its "Decade on Women" (1976 - 1985) that was launched in Mexico City and concluded with the 1985 UN Conference of Women in Nairobi.https://www.un.org/en/conferences/women/nairobi1985 (Global,194) At the same time, Feminist, Murjista, Asian and Womanist Theology and other Liberation theologies were breaking into the theological discourse.. Dr. Teresia Hinga, who attended this first conference of the Circle said that Dr. Oduyoye was frustrated at not seeing African women represented in global liberation theologies. Oduyoye gathered 70 to 80 women from across the African continent to see how they could address patriarchy, racism and sexism rooted in both culture and religion. The primary goal of the circle is to systematically apply a "hermeneutics of suspicion" to both religion and culture and promote publishications and research that facilitates injustices, especially sexism. (Global, 194). The attendees named themselves the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians evoking their non-hierarchical and inclusive methodology. While the first group was primarily Christian, the Circle seeks communality with the multiple religious traditions that find expression on the African continent. The Circle represents the "dialogical approach to religious and cultural tensions" in Africa and beyond. (The Dialogical Imperative in Hinga African Feminist Theologies. 24)

Additional Sources

Adriaan van Klinken. Reimagining Christianity and Sexual Diversity in Africa https://lucas.leeds.ac.uk/article/reimagining-christianity-and-sexual-diversity-in-africa/ LEEDS AFRICAN STUDIES BULLETIN NO. 82 (2021)THURSDAY 4 NOVEMBER 2021

Adriaan van Klinken - Mercy Oduyoya: The Theology of Mercy Amba Oduyoye: Ecumenism, Feminism, and Communal Practice (Notre Dame Studies in African Theology) Hardcover – May 15, 2023

Oredein, Oluwatomisin Word and Witness: A Theological Account of the Life and Voice of Mercy Amba Oduyoye dissertation, Duke Divinity School Duke University 2017 https://dukespace.lib.duke.edu/dspace/handle/10161/16431 https://www.brite.edu/staff/OluwatomisinOredein/

Kotzé, M., 2019, ‘Mothering as sacred duty and metaphor: The theology of Mercy Oduyoye’, in M. Kotzé, N. Marais & N. Müller van Velden (eds.), Reconceiving Reproductive Health: Theological and Christian Ethical Reflections (Reformed Theology in Africa Series Volume 1), pp. 81–94, AOSIS, Cape Town. https://doi.org/10.4102/aosis.2019.BK151.06

Kwok Pui-lan Mercy Amba Oduyoye and African Women's Theology Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion Vol. 20, No. 1 (Spring, 2004), pp. 7-22 (16 pages) Published By: Indiana University Press

Phiri, I.A., 2006, ‘Introduction: Treading softly but firmly’, in I.A. Phiri & S. Nadar (eds.), African women, religion, and health: Essays in Honor of Mercy Amba Ewudziwa Oduyoye, pp. 1–16, Cluster Publications, Pietermaritzbur ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1620320924

(Isabel Phiri notes that for a long time Oduyoye was ‘the only African woman [...] to write and publish theological reflections of any significance’. ((Phiri and Nadar (2006:2, )Furthermore, Oduyoye is regarded as the mother of the Circle of Concerned African Women Theologians and while various descriptions have been ascribed to her work, as summarised by Marais (2015:172), one of the best-known monikers assigned to her is ‘the mother of African women’s theologies’ (Phiri & Nadar 2006:10). Kotze (above, 81))

Oduyoye, Mercy Amba. (1995) Daughters of Anowa: African Women and Patriarchy. (Maryknoll: Orbis Press)

Essay critiquing John Mbiti's Love and Marriage in Africa. 1993.

On April 19, 2018 Mercy Amba Oduyoye, the director of the Institute for Women in Religion and Culture at Trinity Theological Seminary in Ghana, delivered the 33rd Madeleva Lecture at St. Mary's College, founded by the Sisters of the Holy Cross, who have their international novitiate and motherhouse on the campus. Oduyoye is the first person from outside the United States to give the lecture. https://www.globalsistersreport.org/news/spirituality-equality/ghanian-theologian-mercy-amba-oduyoye-offers-madeleva-lecture-53361

Who Will Roll the Stone Away? The Ecumenical Decade of the Churches in Solidarity with Women (1990), Oduyoye records the first two years of the Decade. (Oduyoye, 1990, p. 68).Through this text, she provides an historical overview of the key events that led to the implementation of the Ecumenical Decade including the Community Study and the UN Decade for Women. Emphasizing the importance of churches in solidarity with women, she further delineates the major activities surrounding the launch of the Decade from Africa, Asia, Europe and the Caribbean to Latin America, the Middle East, North America, and the Pacific. Accents of women’s leadership roles and meticulous work during the launch and promotion of the Decade emerge throughout the book showcasing their vital role in its success. Her concluding comments reflect her vision and hope for the Decade “Ten Years Hence?” In the Decade 1988-98 “we seek justice for women, to dream ‘bold dreams’ for a new community, and to act both locally and globally for the conversion of church and society towards the recognition of the full humanity of women”