Matters of doctrinal, religious, and congregational affiliation, though highly personal, are usually influenced by one’s background, community, or encounters
By Rejoice Ngwenya
Last week, my pastor called to enquire why I hadn’t appeared in church as much as I had in 2023. He proposed a visit (hopefully to diffuse simmering backsliding tendencies), so there was no need to proffer a rational explanation for my absence, on the phone.
Yet that got me thinking. Most of us – in our lives -undergo spasms of spiritual, religious, social, professional even political self-introspection. After sustained episodes of repeated association with an idea, institution, belief system or habit, we pause to question why in the first place we ever subscribed to the idea.
More often than not, such decisions as which church to belong to, the EPL team to support, which brand of beer to drink and even political party choice – are totally devoid of rationality but based more on nuanced subjectivity or spontaneous acquaintance.
Matters of doctrinal, religious, and congregational affiliation, though highly personal, are usually influenced by one’s background, community, or encounters. Thus, the pastor’s question ‘why don’t you come to church these days’ is much interrogatively subjective as ‘why do you support Arsenal and not Liverpool, anyway?’
Obviously if one is of Marange rural origins, they are likely to conform to ‘mapostori religion.’ Children of St Albert’s and Lower Gweru provenance are more likely to be Catholic and Adventist, respectively.
Moreover, a man sired in Mbare is more affiliated with Dynamos as one born in Mzilikazi excited about Highlanders.
Most Africans rally behind France in the FIFA World Cup when it plays against an ‘all white’ Argentina, even though France has a reputation of being a repugnant coloniser!
Yet none of this would make sense were we to apply our minds. I mean if you ask why millions of Zimbabweans still vote for Zanu.PF, they are more likely to refer to its ‘revolutionary past’ and totally diminish its culpability in Gukurahundi massacres. And this brings me exactly to the point why I got thinking about the pastor’s esoteric question.
Christians – or should I say religious people – respond to what one can term ‘spark plug spontaneous enthusiasm’ on doctrinal or congregational affinity. Avid bible readers recall that the most celebrated apostolic and ecclesiastic icon ever is Apostle Paul.
I don’t know about other Christians, but I agree with Wikipedia that “St. Paul the Apostle born in Tarsus (now Turkey) was one of the leaders of the first generation of Christians, often considered to be the most important person after Jesus in the history of Christianity.” And we know his Damascene experience.
To put this into perspective, there would be no ‘New Testament’ or ‘Modern Christianity’ without Paul’s prolific ecclesiastic adventures.
The million ZiG question therefore is: had Paul been alive today, would he associate himself with, ‘men of God’ like Emmanuel Makandiwa, Nehemiah Mutendi, Andrew Wutawunashe, Uebert Mudzanire and Walter Magaya?
If he were treading our evangelical paths today, would he sit comfortably in a board of Catholic, Presbyterian, Methodist, Anglican or especially Seventh Day Adventist church elders?
Ruminate on the depth, magnitude, and extent of Paul’s pastoral humility. You will appreciate why he would treat with utmost contempt modern-day doctrinal hypocrisy. I say this because the proliferation of churches in Zimbabwe has truly little to do with salvation.
Fair enough, there is a compelling argument that ‘we all pray to the same God,’ yet arrogant opulence, corruption and political naivety exhibited by church leaders exposes them to entrepreneurial deceit and institutionalised Ponzi schemes rather than fundamental tenets of heavenly salvation.
Walk around Harare’s suburbs, from Highfields, Budiriro, Dzivarasekwa, across to Mandara or even Ruwa where I reside. The largest and fanciest architectural structures are church buildings rather than schools, community centres, hospitals, or factories.
Zimbabweans invest meagre earnings in bigger, better, and more beautiful church buildings than mitigate effects of poverty, homelessness, drug addiction and diseases.
In the same communities that these fancy ‘temples’ are, you will find poor widows, street kids and clinics with no medicines. You will, if you applied your mind, encounter unattended drug addicts, victims of domestic violence and families that afford only one meal a day.
Meanwhile, conmen who label themselves pastors, reverends, bishops, prophets, and apostles drown in rampantly obscene comfort borne of extortionist tithes, offerings and ‘prayer fees’.
And yet the Bible encourages empathy, caring for the poor and liberating the oppressed. When modern day church ‘leaders’ associate with political parties that oppress citizens; when ‘men of God’ do business with corrupt cronies; when church conferences are bankrolled by scandalous womanisers who benefit unfairly from State Tenders – you just wonder if Apostle Paul would have sat in such temples.
“You are not seen in church these days as much as you used to.”
Yes, it would be such a pity to be associated with human scum devoid of spiritual integrity. The Psalmist writes “For he shall deliver the needy when he crieth; the poor also, and [him] that hath no helper. He shall spare the poor and needy and shall save the souls of the needy.
He shall redeem their soul from deceit and violence: and precious shall their blood be in his sight.” Paul did not spare the proverbial rod: “They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption.
For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved.” And he concludes: “For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. So, it is no surprise if his servants, also, disguise themselves as servants of righteousness. Their end will correspond to their deeds.”
So, pastor, the temple is on fire, and you know which knuckleheads set it alight. Would I sit in there only to get charred with the rest of the hypocrites? No sir! I value my freedom more than grovelling to a religious order jaundiced with corrupt money launderers, fiscal vagabonds, gold smugglers and party pawns dressed in doctrinal regalia.
Rejoice Ngwenya is Zimbabwe’s only Liberal Patriot, and he writes from Ruwa, Zimbabwe. The views expressed are his. Contact him at +263772256326
