Diploma in Theology, Zomba Theological College, M.Div., Seminary of the Southwest, Diploma in Community Work, Birmingham University, Ph.D., University of Malawi

 

James Tengatenga has been a clergyman in the Anglican Church since 1985. He has a diploma in theology from Zomba Theological College, Malawi; an M.Div. from the Seminary of the Southwest, Texas; a diploma in community work from Birmingham University, UK; and a Ph.D. from the University of Malawi. He has three D.D.s (honoris causa) from the Seminary of the Southwest, General Seminary, and the Episcopal Divinity School. He has had visiting fellowships at Clare College Cambridge, UK (2002); General Seminary (2004) and the Episcopal Divinity School (2014). He is a recipient of the Cross of St. Augustine from Lambeth Palace and was honored by the Secretary of State of Texas in 2006 as an Honorary Texan.

In the Councils of the Church, he was a member of the Anglican Consultative Council from 2002 and was its chair from 2009 to 2016. He also served as president of the Anglican Family Network. He has served as chair of the Anglican Council in Malawi twice and chair of the Malawi Council of Churches. He has also served as a member of the Inter-Anglican Commission for Ecumenical Relations. Tengatenga has been on the board of the Foundation of St. Georges College, Jerusalem, and Zomba Theological College. He has been vice chair of the Malawi National Examination Board. He was also a founding member of the Malawi National AIDS Commission. He has until recently chaired the Public Affairs Committee (the most influential multi-faith civil society body in Malawi). He also served for a number of years in the Steering Committee of the Pan-African Civil Educators Network and is a visiting facilitator at the Grail Centre’s (South Africa) Training for Transformation training courses. He currently serves as on the grants committee for SIM and is a member of its board. 

Research Interests
  • Missions
  • African Church History
  • African Theologies
  • Global Anglicanism
  • East African/Indian Ocean Slavery and Slave Trade

Publications

Tengatenga has contributed chapters to several books and given talks and lectures in many places. He has authored one book, Church State and Society in Malawi (2006); co-authored an HIV/AIDS training manual, Time to Talks (2006) with the Rev Dr. Anne Bailey, edited The UMCA in Malawi: A History of the Anglican Church (2010). He is on the editorial boards of the Journal of Anglican Studies (Cambridge university Press) and Modern Believing (Liverpool University Press) and is a regular reviewer of articles for the Journal of Theology in Southern Africa and the Journal of Gender Relations in Africa. 

 

Parish/Pastoral Ministry

Tengatenga served eight years in parish ministry in Lilongwe (the capital city of Malawi), six of which were in the deprived part of the city among the urban poor. Inter alia he was the Diocesan youth worker and later, in addition, he was canon to the ordinary. For five years he taught theology, Church history, pastoralia, New Testament Greek, homiletics at Zomba Theological College and Theology and Church History at the University of Malawi. After teaching he became diocesan Bishop of Southern Malawi, in which position he served for fifteen and a half years.