The deaf will hear! The blind will see! The lame will walk! The poor will be uplifted to prosperity! These are the mantras that reverberate across Africa in the world of faith healing.
The practice was thrust into the spotlight again through the tragic incident in Nigeria recently, when more than 100 people were killed. They had traveled to seek guidance and healing from a Christian televangelist, self-proclaimed "prophet" T.B. Joshua, and died when the building they were staying in (which was owned by Joshua) collapsed.
The spectrum of faith healing is one that varies with great complexity across the continent. Whether it is the traditional seer or shaman, the sangoma of Southern Africa, the juju and voodoo priests of West Africa, the Pentecostal prophets or the Orthodox exorcist, the spread and the increasing acceptance of faith healing in Africa is phenomenal.
The faith healers use a gamut of methods in plying their trade: prayers, laying on of hands while chanting religious incantations, providing "holy" water, oil and other paraphernalia. Similar is the number of problems presented for faith healing. These can include bad luck, sleeplessness, bad dreams, alcoholism, purported demonic attacks, poverty, protracted diseases and even death.
Traditional Africa's medicinal regimes, healing practices and beliefs continue to fan the enduring fascination with faith healing in contemporary society. In its most basic sense, traditional Africa holistically intertwined the divine, cultural and religious aspects. Illnesses, whether physical or psychological, are believed to be caused by external forces, in most cases evil spirits, or as punishment from the divine for societal or personal transgressions.
Modern medicine and the spread of Christianity and other modern religions have not eradicated these concepts. In fact, there exists a metamorphosed blend of all these, as indicated by the South African Pharmaceutical Journal of September 2007, which reported that up to 60 percent of South Africans concurrently consulted a sangoma while also under the treatment of a primary healthcare provider in a modern hospital. The same individuals often also belonged to a religious denomination that used scriptural guidance as solutions to illness and other prevailing pestilences.
In Kenya, tragic and disheartening cases are commonplace where families withdraw critically sick patients from hospital beds and lead them to healing and miracle prayer meetings where they end up dying. In distressingly bizarre incidents in East and West Africa, some religious sects have stuck to faith healers and rejected any medical intervention, not even basic vaccinations such as polio for newborns, to their own peril.
Faith-healing followers range across all sectors of society, from celebrities and politicians to those living below the breadline. To these millions, questioning the potency or authenticity of their faith-healing activities may even be deemed sacrilegious. Conducted within the "holy" brackets of the divine and in the name of God, faith healing comes with an unflinching moral tone. This impedes any attempt by the masses to critically interrogate their discipleship to many of these churches, which sometimes turn into cults and can have disastrous results for individuals and society.
Without delving into the debate of an omnipotent and omniscient power and without malice to mainstream religious teachings and dogma, it must be acknowledged that mischievous exploitation of scripture is rampant in Africa. Some acts of faith healers defy logic. In a continent ravaged by poverty, disease, civil discontent and general underdevelopment, it is prudent to inquire why faith healers haven't made drastic progressive changes to their societies using their powers.
Kenyan author Jeremy Leariwala dismisses the bulk of the faith-healing czars as charlatans who prey on the desperation of people in distress. The mystery of the unknown and the aura of supernatural powers is the bait, he asserts. A clear example is the rise of the so-called "prosperity gospel" churches spreading across Africa like bushfire, who ask followers to donate money to churches as a way of "planting a seed." In return they are supposed to reap prosperity from the bounties of heaven.
Poor men and women give their all, but the bottom line is they are enriching the faith-healing preachers who live a lavish life. While pews in the ancient cathedrals of Europe are emptying daily, in Africa, where Europeans had exported their faith, a church can be found in every corner in every city and village, all hawking faith healing and prosperity, when the results say the opposite. What comparative irony between the two continents!
(Mauya Omauya teaches international affairs/politics and is an editor in Kenya.)
