REVEALED: CAN President Pastor Oritsejafor
Explains Why Pastors Are Richer Than Their
Members In Nigeria
President of the Christian Association of
Nigeria, Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor recently
bared his mind concerning the controversies
surrounding churches and their flamboyant
pastors.
When asked to explain why churches milk
the poor, the CAN president and Senior
pastor of Word of Life Bible Church, said “it
is cheap to criticise; even to criticise what
you don’t understand.
Let me put it this way, in every good people,
you would always find some bad people. The
church is the greatest institution that has
made the country today. If you look back,
you would find out that the church brought
education to Nigeria.”
Speaking further to Punch, he said “The
church brought hospital to Nigeria. I think the
church should be given credit for that. People
don’t understand what they say about the
church milking the poor. Can a poor man
have money to pay tithe? A man who has no
job, can he pay tithe? No, he won’t be able to
pay. So how do you milk a man who has no
milk? In a church, you have both the poor
and the rich. It is generally not the poor that
finance the church.
It is those with the means. A man, for
example, who earns N10,000, how much is
his tithe? His tithe is N1,000. A man who
earns N500,000, how much is his tithe? His
tithe is 10 per cent which is N50,000. How
much would you milk from a man who pays
a tithe of N1000?
“We won’t say things like this usually
because the church is a level-playing
ground. Whether you are poor or you are
rich, God sees everybody as equal. It is
because of a question like this that
sometimes, we have to take time to analyze
things. I even hear people say that the poor
give money to start schools, but their
children cannot go to the schools.
How will they give this money when they are
poor? The truth is that, the people who
actually give this money are those who have
the means to do so. Those people make it
possible for churches to start schools. Now
again, why do churches charge high fees in
school? You didn’t ask me that, but I’m just
throwing that in free. People must
understand that there is a standard.
“The church wants to maintain the standard.
In those days, some people will say that
when missionaries started school, it was
free. Don’t forget that those missionaries
were being financed from different places.
Who is financing us today? We are financing
ourselves. If I got free financing, why won’t
we make education free? You must also
understand that at the time, the cost of living
was not the way it is today.
The educational system of Nigeria is in
serious trouble, so we need to up the
standards. And to do that, you should be able
to hire the best hands. If you hire the best,
how do you pay them? Where do you get the
money to pay them? How do you put the
right infrastructure in place? How do you do
many of the things that need to be done?
How do you run the generators?”
On why there are so many poor people in
churches yet rich pastors, Oritsejafor who
recently completed an ultra modern 40,000
capacity church auditorium in Warri, Delta
State, explained, “Remember that the pastors
are pasturing both the poor and the rich.
They are all in the same assembly. Both the
poor and the rich, those who have the means
in the church take time to be kind to their
pastors. That is something most people don’t
realize.
They give their pastors money, food and
different things. For example, a member of
the church goes to his pastor and says, ‘I
feel led to give you a car. Take this car.’
Now the pastor has a car. Did he steal it? As
I sit here talking to you now, I can tell you
that I am training almost 100 people in
institutions of higher learning. Nobody is
going to broadcast that. On every 26th of
December, I organise what I call poverty
alleviation. I have been doing it now for about
eight years.”
Defending his aircraft and rift with Mallam
Nasir el-Rufai “I am glad that there are
people who challenged him. I would only be
dignifying him if a person at my level starts
exchanging words with a small person like
el-Rufai. He is too small. I will not dignify
him with a response. People responded.
They told him that since he knew who gave
the gift, he should provide the proof, which
he hasn’t done till today. Obviously, he didn’t
have any proof. That is the problem with
Nigeria. We continue to celebrate people like
el-Rufai. He is too small for me. I won’t
waste my time on him”.
Monday, 31 March 2014
CAN President Pastor Oritsejafor Explains Why Pastors Are Richer Than Their
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment