Unchecked church growth defeats Jesus’ unity wish

Worshipers at Kakamega Fellowship Church in Kakamega town hold special prayers on January 24, 2016 for Kenya Defence Forces soldiers. Christians have just concluded the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity—an annual observance since 1908. PHOTO | ISAAC WALE | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Indeed, the selfish nature of the emerging quasi-religious institutions is what sparked the November 2014 ban on registration of new churches. Remember the Victor Kanyari 310 rip-off?
  • Although it will be eons before the unity Christ envisaged in John 17 is realised, the fact that there are Christians, who are committed to a united church, is cause for celebration.

On a recent visit to my home sub-county of Butere, a sister-in-law pointed at a desolate building by a footpath.

It was a church, she said, whose members were a man, his wife and two young relatives.

As an Anglican Church of Kenya Mothers’ Union member, Margaret was scandalised that the couple had set up yet another house of worship in a predominantly Anglican and Roman Catholic area.

Her outrage was surprising, given that proliferation of churches in Kenya long ceased to be news, which is why it is at the centre of government efforts to regulate religious institutions.

While ‘the more the merrier’ adage might explain the mushrooming of churches, most of them bearing the ‘ministry’ tag, it is not lost to an observer that many such outfits are just cash cows for their owners.

Indeed, the selfish nature of the emerging quasi-religious institutions is what sparked the November 2014 ban on registration of new churches. Remember the Victor Kanyari 310 rip-off?

With President Kenyatta and Chief Justice Willy Mutunga adding their voices to the need to regulate the booming religious industry, an important but little-discussed issue is: ‘What would Jesus do’ — or say — of such a situation.

Yet it is a pertinent issue at this time when Christians have just concluded the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity—an annual observance since 1908.

SINGLE ORGAN
That Roman Catholics, their Orthodox and Protestant sisters and brothers worldwide unite to celebrate their oneness in Christ is a matter that calls for reflection at a time when fragmentation, particularly in Kenya, has assumed alarming proportions.

This year’s Week of Prayer for Christian Unity was launched at the Presbyterian Church of East Africa (PCEA) St Andrew’s Church in Nairobi, where Fr Innocent Maganya of the Missionaries of Africa (the White Fathers) preached a sermon titled: Called to Proclaim the Mighty Works of God.

Fr Maganya is the treasurer of the International Ecumenical Movement Kenya Chapter (IEM-K), which comprises clergy and laity from mainstream Christian denominations, all guided by Chapter 17 of St John’s Gospel.

Three times in the Gospel, Jesus’ plea for one church is repeated... “protect them by the power of your name—the name you gave me—so that they may be one as we are one” (John 17:11).

That Jesus’ yearning for one church was expressed just before his crucifixion is telling.

It means that despite the merits of the much-hyped unity in diversity, Jesus’ earnest desire was for one church. And yet, divisions persist.

Fr Maganya quoted part of the commentary of the third day of the just-concluded week of prayer: “The world cannot believe that we are Jesus’s disciples while our love for one another is incomplete. We feel the pain of this division when we cannot receive together the body and blood of Christ at the Eucharist, the sacrament of unity.”

A GOOD START

He went on to quote Pope Francis, who has often said that division in a Christian community is one of the worst sins.

Division does not come from God... It is a scandal, above all, because it comes from the devil, the pontiff says.

Although it will be eons before the unity Christ envisaged in John 17 is realised, the fact that there are Christians, who are committed to a united church, is cause for celebration.

It is significant that although the IEM-K is more that 20 years old, it was only listed with the Registrar of Societies in November 2014 — around the same time the government banned registration of new religious institutions.

Although the National Council of Churches of Kenya and the Kenya Conference of Catholic Bishops have cautioned over the intention to regulate the mushrooming of churches, the IEM-K’s mission of uniting the Church of Christ deserves consideration.

Ms Kweyu is a freelance journalist and consulting editor. [email protected].