Editor’s Note: Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com
By Samuel Estefanous
estefanoussamuel@yahoo.com
The one thing I take maximum care to avoid like the plague is religious controversy. It just doesn’t give me much sense to try to win a religious argument. Something in my heart tells me it is sacrilegious. I don’t know, maybe it is because I’m not so good at it.
At any rate if you ask me stupid that I am I take the scripture literally. When St. Paul says women shouldn’t invade the pulpit, I understand it exactly as it is written. When the Apostle writes a man shouldn’t wear his hair long. I will not try to reach for the Catholic Encyclopedia or look up the sermons of a prophet on tick-tok to understand the meaning of the apostolic words ‘long’. For me they are crystal clear and as a lawyer I would rather abide by the maxim –in claris non fit interpretatio!
So this isn’t about the private individual choices we make when it comes to religion, but about the temporal toxic spillovers that are affecting us and posterity on a daily basis.
Behind every Social Chaos lurks…
Why do we need religious fathers? I guess to tame our wild drives and impulses, to break our raw emotions, to rein in our propensity to judge others, to make us the best we are capable of under God. Instead the Holy Fathers and brothers are goading us to insult, degrade and hold others of different faith in utter contempt.
They complicate the faith to make it inaccessible to the faithful, in other words they wedge a rift between the faith and the faithful in an effort to make their own trade a booming enterprise. Alright, why does the fondest memory of our faith go back to our childhood days? Simply because back then we were the closest to God- in our simplicity and innocence!
Modern day proselytizers are always casting aspersions. They are always angry. There isn’t a trace of love in their demeanor. They are always setting one group of the faithful against another. They are incredibly self-righteous and occasionally taunt the faithful with untoward heresy saying stuff like they are Ambassador Plenipotentiary of the Lord in a given locality and brazenly preach that our soul needs to be stamped with their visa to earn salvation .
Again I am not talking about the faithful, oh no, the faithful are for the most part humble lambs. I mean the Gospel-Industrialists who have made multi-billion birr thriving businesses out of the words of the Lord.
So much so that folks are conjecturing that behind every social disaccord there lurks a shifty eyed preacher seeding conflict. Of course not all of them, a handful are serving the office with enviable commitment, naturally they are hardly visible. They carry out their holy duties without the help of cameras and elaborate vestments. In contrast the faith- entrepreneurs are always doing some ‘interpretations’ and writing a brand new article of religion in the process. They are so damn emboldened that they have crossed over the creepy zone and folks have begun to fear them in good earnest.
They need to be told ‘…in the name of freedom of religion and conscience you have come thus far but not an inch further.’ The government has every right to intervene as they have become veritable menaces to society.
There are established criminal definitions of liability in such circumstances. In the very least the government could invoke expressly provided criminal offences of Enticement and preying on the faithful by promising false redemption for gain.
Driven by the motif of material Gain
God has mercy on my sinning soul but sometimes when I listen to some of this army of fiery proselytizers or protectors of the faith or emissaries of the prophet the first word that comes to my mind is ‘nutcase’. They sound like embodiments of troubled wandering spirits. Something about them doesn’t feel right.
Like I noted before and as defined by the revised penal code, they have a common propensity to prey on weak souls. ‘They get you when you are vulnerable or when you are down on your luck’ I had heard a widow in mourning protest angrily a few years ago.
As if that isn’t enough now peddlers of the faith have come in droves to scramble for the soul of the faithful in the social media battlefield. They are master playwrights of the highest grade. They very well know that only ‘conflict’ keeps a story going. Hence if there is none one has to be created somehow. I believe that is how they write plays-creating elaborate- መቸየትና ግጭት፡፡ Then follows the phony intro-line…to the hundreds of thousands of Ethiopian and Eritrean followers of the channel…(incidentally for some reason this appeal to Eritrean audiences is rarely reciprocated from the other end, how pathetic is that?).
When their guest wouldn’t break down they would keep pushing him/her to the limit. They would say something like ‘…in my ten years of hosting the show I have never heard a story as heart wrenching as yours.’ They would even press tissues to have the guest dry non-existent tears.
Keeping the faithful in perpetual fear, intimidation and subjugation
At one time in one way or another we do lean on somebody when we aren’t strong enough to withstand the currents of life. Someone who props you up wants to see you going tough and strong because there is indeed a great sense of deserved pride in helping a fellow being stand firm.
However religious gurus always want to hold the faithful on some kind of leash. They want to keep their victims in a perpetual state of weakness. In other words they try to deny them the heavenly truth that is promised to set the faithful free.
All sorts of transactional redemption are openly practiced in exchange of material gains under duress. The ‘reverential fear’ tool employed by preacher realtors, lodge operators, import-export traders to fraud sales by scamming the faithful has been the talk of the town.
I think it is high time the government take edifying lessons from the experience of Rwanda and ‘show its mettle’ for the good of the larger public. Let peace prevail; as it is there isn’t a semblance of peace in the halls and places of prayer and worship-for the most part at least.
God Bless.
Editor’s Note: Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com
__
Join our Telegram Channel: t.me/borkena
Like borkena on Facebook
To submit a press release, send the submission to info@borkena.com
Add your business to Ethiopian Business Listing / Ethiopian Business Directory
Join the conversation. Follow us on X (formerly Twitter) @zborkena to get the latest Ethiopian news updates regularly.The Gospel Market Meltdown in Ethiopia