Preying pastors

 Going “by their fruits” with which they’ve come to be known, there’s no iota of doubt that most Nigerian pastors are big time con artists. While some armed robbers prefer to operate under the cover of darkness, these pastors brazenly rob in broad daylight. On the eve of the final day of the 61st annual convention of the Redeemed Christian Church of God, RCCG – held in Mowe, Ogun State, in August 2013 – the church’s general overseer said something to members of his flock. Pastor Enoch Adeboye announced his church would build a three-kilometre long auditorium – with a capacity to sit three million people – along the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. The new auditorium was necessitated by the fact that the existing RCCG auditorium, which was built in 2000 with a capacity to sit one million people, could no longer accommodate the millions of people who come there to worship God, Adeboye said. Without waiting for the announcement to sink into the minds of his congregation, Adeboye began asking them to fund the project. “We need ten people to donate N1 billion for this project and if you are one of them, please see my personal secretary after we finish today,” he said. “If you know you can afford to donate N100 million for the expansion of our church auditorium, please do endeavour to see my personal secretary also. Everyone needs to be part of the project. The next category will be for those that can afford to support the project with N50 million, N20 million, N5 million, N1 million to as low as N100.” Where exactly did Adeboye expect his church members to get the money they would donate to him if not by stealing from the Nigerian public? The same way Adeboye solicited for fund from members of his church for the new auditorium was the very same way he talked them into chipping in to pay for the establishment of RCCG’s Redeemer’s University in 2005. Earlier in 2002, David Oyedepo, owner of Winners Chapel, used Adeboye’s methodology to pay for the setting up of his own Covenant University in Ota, Ogun State. Although 59-year-old Oyedepo told the world in 2012 that “Covenant University was built within seven months without any collection of any one naira tithes and offerings or donation of any kind from anywhere,” his university and that of Oyedepo are beyond the reach of those whose tithes and offerings and donations were used in building them. This is because the two universities are on the list of a growing number of private universities in Nigeria that are too expensive for the children of ordinary Nigerians to attend. Both Adeboye and Oyedepo are two of Africa’s wealthiest pastors. They both have private jets and have political connections in Nigeria. Other rich pastors in Nigeria who operate in the same way as Adeboye and Oyedepo abound. They include William Kumuyi, Chris Oyakhilome, Chris Okotie and Lazarus Muoka, to mention a few. Mathematician and founder of Deeper Life Bible Church, Kumuyi, won’t allow female members of his church to wear earrings or apply makeup. Donning wedding gowns and holding a bouquet are alien to Deeper Life’s doctrine and are strictly forbidden at weddings. Other things are wrong with Kumuyi’s church. Hypocrisy and double standard are just two of them. In June 2013, Kumuyi’s second son, John Kumuyi, and Love – daughter of the National Overseer of Deeper Life Bible Church in Jamaica, Pastor Augustine Odih – engaged in acts which negated the church’s tradition during their wedding held in Jamaica. The bride was dressed in a stylish, transparent fitted wedding gown with short sleeves. She wore jewelry and makeup and also carried a bouquet of flowers. The couple cut a huge wedding cake and cruised in a limousine after their wedding reception. The hue and cry the extravagant wedding generated prompted Kumuyi’s son and his new wife to write to their church “to express our deepest and most sincere apology for the turn of events, that have resulted on our traditional and wedding ceremonies, that took place in Jamaica on 13th June and 15th June, 2013 respectively.” The story of how Chris Oyakhilome, Chris Okotie, Lazarus Muoka and some other pastors are enriching themselves at the expense of gullible Nigerians, as well as not practicing what they preach, will be subject of another write-up in the near future. Like Adeboye and Oyedepo, these other pastors are close to Nigerian leaders. Yet, they watch as their friends continually lead Nigeria into the ditch without rebuking and condemning them. Jesus Christ would have done the exact opposite. Desmond Tutu and Martin Luther King, Jr. would have spoken out against them, openly. All of these pastors spend hundreds of millions of dollars on private security annually. Yet they always remind their followers to never be afraid to die for their faith. Why are they afraid of dying in “active service,” exactly the way Christ did?