The Impact of Some Modes of Women Liberation to African Christian Families: A Case of Kagio Town in Kirinyaga County

Abstract

The contemporary African Christian family is ideally a harmonious monogamous relation or union between two people of the opposite gender- a male and a female- and is largely nuclear. This family setting has continued to increasingly face a lot of challenges, threatening its well-being and existence. Some of these challenges include: increased cases of divorce, suicide-murder of spouses and children, separations, suicide of children, increased rate of single parenthood, among other concerns. These problems are largely relational in nature and attributed to impossible or problematic relationships between the spouses.Owing to the centrality of the family to the well-being of the society, the cry of an ailing and hurting family cannot be ignored. The African Christian family has encountered many waves of changes and challenges, some which have aimed at making it a better institution and others which have left it maimed and in turmoil. The study is on gender relations in the family and how some modes of women liberation have impacted on the nature of gender relations in the African Christian family and therefore the family as a whole. This study is based in Kagio town in Kirinyaga County. An understanding of the ideal African Christian family, which is an inculturative product of the African and the Christian traditions, is provided.

DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n5p31