| (left) General Overseer (Pastor) Enoch Adejare Adeboye, The Redeemed Christian Church of God, and (right) Bishop David Oyedepo, Founder/Co-Owner, Living Faith (a.k.a. Winners Chapel) Ministries, Nigeria Many think that consciousness is not connected to the processes of the inventiveness of power. Yet, life is all about power. And unfortunately, that is how things will remain, at least so long as we remain what we are: human beings. We will in fact require more extensive and expansive researches to begin to fathom what it really means to be human, and these efforts must be prepared to this in more than the usual ways. According to Kardong Kenneth, “there is a God-hole in everyone’s head.” Many will argue, many will agree. But who knows what that hole looks like? Could he have been absolutely right! The world has not known the full potential damage that religion would wreak because the attention at peace-making is either facile or ignoring the very energy of all religions, from theistic to atheistic. The possibilities of religion have opened up more untold possibilities and it now seems that the power of human choice is petering away by the day. How troubling is it with anyone to think about the realities that come with losing long acquired power? Very troubling! To request some of someone else’s time can also be very intrusive. Yet, there is something we all often take for granted—the sources of our social power. I have heard many talk about Oprah Winfrey as being led by the Devils (or even the gods?), so long as it does not have a capital ‘G’. What is Oprah Winfrey doing that is wrong and what makes some one like Adeboye right? What am I doing when I say “that is not how to pray,” “you should go to church or mosque.” Or, what do I propose when I say “you must be saved”? Who is right and who is wrong? In fact, to put it more bluntly: who can be right and who must be wrong? Is Enoch Adeboye, General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God right because his church is of God? Or, is David Oyedepo founder and co-owner of Living Faith Ministries right because of something I do not know? Perhaps, Oprah is really wrong because God is a man and these two are men, directly inheriting God’s genetic righteousness. Again, could Oprah be wrong and indeed following the devil’s impulse because she is new in the business of religion? Then, time might be the healer of the wound of her wrong. |
