On my way to Oyo from Ibadan some 15 years ago, I was involved in an accident as the bus in which I rode skidded off the road. Luckily, no one was hurt. One of the passengers, an old woman, burst into song and dance, chanting: “Mo mo l’oore” (I recognise it as divine help). Being a believer, I was fascinated with the woman’s open, unabashed display of gratitude to Almighty God. That, precisely, was the kind of scenario that was to take place at the Dunamis International Gospel Centre (DIGC) last week, but there was a spiritual editor that cut the sheer outpouring of gratitude to God short. Anyim Vera, a fresh law graduate who would later be revealed as a policewoman, was apparently excited and wanted everyone in the church to know what God had done for her. The first graduate in her nuclear family, she had obtained the degree after a lot of travails. A snippet of her testimony: “I kept going to the extent that I got to my 500 level, and challenges everywhere— problems, sickness. They afflict me with leg pain, and I was not able to finish; my mates had finished. The law programme is six years, but since I was unable to meet up, I keep on like that. But yesterday, I graduated.”
Strangely, Enenche turned the testimony into an inquisition, asking in a sneering tone what kind of degree she was talking about, and going bananas once the woman mistakenly said “BSc in Law.” The woman actually corrected the slip after Enenche pointed out the oddity in her pronouncement, but her pastor was never going to turn back from his five minutes of fame. Hear him: “The moment she talked about a law degree, I knew there is (sic) nothing like ‘law’ in what she was saying. No matter how bad it is, it hasn’t reached that level. Is there any lawyer here with a BSc in Law?” He then ordered her out of the pulpit. He even asked arrogantly: “Is that how lawyers talk?”
As calls for an apology increased following the incident, Dunamis released a low-IQ statement that was even more arrogant than its pastor’s act. The statement contained no apology but only regretted the outcome of Enenche’s bilious, dehumanizing act. The so-called apology began by avoiding responsibility: “A scenario was created on Sunday the 14th April at the Glory Dome…” Created by who?
It is interesting that Enenche left the substance of the testimony to pursue trifles, namely the testifier’s linguistic performance, which as the linguist Noam Chomsky showed us decades ago is not always reflective of competence. Now, there is something called face and politeness, and speaking English, or indeed any language, requires formal and functional competence. For instance, if in reply to the question, “Can I speak with Dr Olagunju?”, the secretary says over the phone, “Yes,” she would sound odd to the speaker on the other end who is actually requesting that Dr Olagunju be brought to the phone. Traditionally, English is a language in which requests (which are typically impositions) are usually couched in the form of questions (Could you please let Dr Mills know I called?, etc). A person typically issuing commands (“Tell me your name, tell your friend I called”) would sound extremely odd and would, at the very least, be considered brash if not uncouth. It is a question of limited exposure to English, which is quite evident in Enenche’s horrible performance.
As opposed to writing, speaking is usually characterised by certain limitations, including false starts, incomplete sentences, etc. It is therefore unintelligent to make definitive pronouncements on a speaker’s competence on the basis of a quick performance, particularly one in which there are manifestly unequal power relations. I have read a lot of lawyers claiming that Vera’s performance is too poor for a lawyer, etc. I notice, though, as an editor in a media house, that the opinion essays I receive from lawyers typically require long hours of editing that delay production. The point is this: even if a person’s linguistic performance is below par, why subject them to public ridicule? Is the testimony to man or God? We say nonsense before God all the time and He patiently listens and does not interrupt us, yet He is the Maker of our vocal chords and the God of language. The Bible says we do not know how to pray. Where would Enenche be if God treated him the way he treated that poor woman? And by the way, can people who don’t even speak English worship Enenche’s deity?
But how can these clowns do better when they have appointed themselves as the saviours of men? How do you allow a woman old enough to be your grandma to kneel before you, calling you Papa? When you are Papa and Daddy, then what’s God going to be? These are not men of God but gods of men. A so-called man of God even listed the kinds of soup we are supposed to eat to make heaven!
These spiritual fraudsters are quick to use their ‘connections’ to detain critics in police cells. They rush to the courts to obtain dubious injunctions. They rule their lodges with fear, enslaving the people. By the way, if you think a genuine preacher of the Gospel can own a limousine, totally nullifying exampleship, stay in your corner. There’s no such example from Genesis to Revelation. As I have said before, what these spiritual entrepreneurs (including one accused of sexually assaulting women by pretending to deliver them from demon possession through their privates!) are actually engaged in is money ritual, what the Yoruba call osole to daju. How else do you think a man can own multibillion dollar businesses preaching Jesus Christ? Are we talking of the same Man of Galilee who didn’t even have a roof over his head, and whose apostles were all killed in the most brutal fashion, except John who was boiled in hot oil and banished to the Isle of Patmos when he would not die?
The only thing these clowns have is money and more money; they have nothing of salvational value to offer anyone. They are not of the class of those stoned, sawn asunder, tempted and slain with the sword; who “wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented.” (Hebrews 11:37). Even animals know more of God than these vainglorious clowns whose wives aren’t even contented with the Biblical title, Sister, anymore, but are “mummies”, being First Ladies laden with cash in their husbands’ carnal kingdoms. You need to see them walking elegantly with “to-match” bags in the church, secure in the power of money, and knowing less of God than a jack rabbit! How will they react to my writing? Like their father, Lucifer.
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