Truth House Frowns at the chaotic material stewardship witnessed in the PCC in the last decade

God and Mammon in the Church: “You cannot serve both God and mammon”. Matt 6:24.

The chaotic material stewardship witnessed in the PCC in the last decade makes these words of Christ strikingly relevant. If the ambient financial indiscipline has not yet triggered

a major upheaval in the Church, it is certainly thanks to the largely undeserved blind trust that most Christians still have in their ordained or elected leaders. Or better still, thanks to the fact that their minds have been formatted to not question whatever is done in God’s name, no matter how hideous it may be. The impunity with which Church property is being looted is so brazen and provocative that by the time this veil of gullibility finally gets lifted, there may not be much of a Church left. Building Projects and the Path to Wealth. In the first half of the decade, we heard of a pastor who allegedly wangled close to ten million CFA in Nsimyong. He was not held accountable. Instead, he was promoted. The same pastor is now

strenuously denying accusations of extorting hundreds of thousands from Christians in Kumba and Bonamoussadi as fees for funeral and other services. In Ntamulung, another one is on the war path with the CWF women, using the pulpit to rain insults on them for not

contributing as much as he wanted for his so-called Project of Faith. This, TruthHouse has learnt, is a construction launched shortly after his appointment last December, brushing aside another two uncompleted ones he had met. One is a multipurpose hall, which the congregation

has been struggling with for the past thirty years. The second is a Presbytery manse/secretariat, which was started about ten years ago but has now been

abandoned. It must be noted that this pastor is one of the KPs whom their grand master appointed before leaving, as a reward for doing his dirty work. Like their master, they are

faithful servants of mammon, more concerned about feathering their material nests than ensuring the spiritual upkeep of the Christians. Like him, they have found in construction projects like these a sure path to quick and easy personal enrichment. Thanks to the unchecked inflation of bills, percentages collected as bribes from contractors, and the traffic of building materials, they have the latitude to carry out their personal construction projects side-by-side with those of the Church. That explains the craze for a new building project, with the pastor reportedly personalizing the collection, custody and control of the funds. And to douse the flames of controversy ignited by the very expensive project, he is reported to have led a handpicked delegation to Synod 2 Hill, to hoodwink the Moderator into legitimizing it in total disregard for the cries of the overburdened congregation. Truth House painfully recalls the death of Rev. Franklin Anye, who had to leave the Church after being victimized for resisting instructions to inflate the budget for a Men’s Work secretariat he was trying to construct. It’s now an open secret how much his replacement paid to get his job.
Truth House also knows what happened to the WWD secretary who refused to hand over her department’s budgetary surplus of 25 million to the boss without justification. She was demoted. All of this follows the playbook of the grandmaster’s regime, and illustrates how
difficult it is for the same person to serve God and mammon. But though we know that old habits die hard, TH dares to hope that the Rt. Rev. Miki will firmly blaze a new trail.
Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely. he rain began beating us in the PCC the day we were conned into putting an untested, materialistic young man at its helm, and allowed him to wrest absolute power through an instrument called Power of Attorney. Contrary to the design of the founding fathers, this instrument was brazenly abused to override all the checks and balances that had hitherto made the PCC a sane institution. Now this power of attorney

needs to be promptly revisited, to save the current and future moderators from the temptation that has destroyed their predecessor. As our name implies, we are a Church of

elders. The average congregation has one teaching elder (pastor) who should be more than busy with nourishing the people spiritually, as well as 5 to 25 elected ruling elders who should handle administration and finance. In every congregation, you will also find Christians

with talents and training ready for deployment in various specialized committees, including finance and projects, often for free. So why does money seem to override spiritual nurture among the preoccupations of most pastors? What reason does the Church have for neglecting Peter’s wise words in Acts 6:2? “It is not right for us to neglect the preaching of God’s word to handle finances.”

Does a three-year training in the seminary qualify a pastor to manage money better than all the Christians in the

congregations? Who’s Farming the MDP? This week, the Department of Lay Training and Evangelism will be

concluding its second music workshop in two years, organized by a one-man orchestra of a national secretary who, after taking Christians to court in Douala, got appointed to LTE without knowing a bean about music. What interests Truth House is not the chaotic, uninformed organization of the workshops, but the fact that Christians still pay $35,000 each to attend. Consider that the PCC has about 1500 congregations, each with at least four choirs (some have double that number). That would make at least 6000 choirs. If each choir pays only 5000 CFA a year for the upkeep of the Music Development Programme, that would be 30 million FCFA. Can the Department of Lay Training deny that this money is being collected during choir rallies every year? So why does the department still collect fees for music workshops? Where does the money go when there are Church

music projects that need attention? It is not hard to guess why, for many years, the former hierarchy looked the other way. But now the choirs themselves should demand answers to these questions.

Hurtful Harvests we are now at the threshold of another harvest season. The Church is levying congregations, which in turn are levying the Christians, the same way the secular government levies taxes on the population – without

a care about where the money comes from. Pastors, either desperate to produce financial results so as to guarantee their promotions, pile pressure on Christians to meet these levies, ignoring the fact that many of these Christians cannot afford one decent meal a day for their families. Is harvest not supposed to be a voluntary

thanks offering from what the Lord has given us? Why are pastors, like relentless tax collectors, pushing Christians to give grudgingly? And we extend this exploitation to group and movement rallies. It seems alright for groups that have no carpenters or farmers to buy and present furniture or bunches of plantain to get marks at these rallies. It does not matter that we are turning Christian groups into liars and cheats, as long as we get money out of them. And now the Pentecostals have taught us how to use tithes to milk Christians. Every Sunday now there is an altar call for Christians to step out with their tithes in exchange for a special prayer. Is that a

commercial prayer bought at a special price, distinguishing the giver from the collective prayer after offering?

Some pastors prescribe currency units to be offered, even requiring Christians to put the offering on a tabletop for everyone to see. What happened to the Scripture which says the left hand should not see what the right hand gives? Giving an Account, finally, what about accountability? Most congregational announcements disclose to the Christians what was collected the previous Sunday. Why does that accountability end at the congregational level? Do the congregations not deserve the same disclosures from the presbyteries, and the presbyteries from the Synod? In the past, there was trust, and people did not insist on these disclosures, but the blatant abuses of the last decade have killed trust. In case you think TH is being unduly alarmist, look at the current statistics of giving in the Church and you will be shocked at the drop. That is the writing on the Church’s

wall. For Christians to give cheerfully, they need the Church to show them some respect by 1. Telling them what they are being asked to give for 2. Demonstrating that what they give is used exactly for the avowed purpose

3. Visiting clear penalties on all indecent financial stewards without exception. This is why we cannot sign off this issue of True Talk without repeating our call for a new financial chief steward in the PCC.

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing” Edmund Burke