Imago Dei and Consumership in Neo-Prophetic Pentecostal Churches in South Africa

Abstract

The church in the twenty-first century is confronted by the commercialisation of religion, something that has been particularly prevalent in certain Neo-Prophetic Pentecostal churches, which are typically characterised by spiritual leaders who represent God in their own image. Religious consumership persists in these churches, because spiritual leaders deify themselves in the eyes of their members. It is a daunting exercise to determine the rationale behind these heinous practices, which may have detrimental financial and health-related consequences. Some Neo-Prophetic Pentecostal churches have materialistic spiritual leaders who manipulate members to participate in religious consumership as the most (if not only) potent means of securing divine intervention to address their problems. These materialistic and domineering religious leaders abuse the very imago Dei in their members which they are supposed to nurture through scripturally sound doctrine. The objective of this chapter is to discuss the rationale that drives these spiritual leaders to perform such practices in church, and to determine how the church can deal with the dehumanising acts inflicted on gullible communities, many of whom are downtrodden. The argument made here, is that spiritual leaders and congregants alike should understand what it means to be created in the image of God, and how a true understanding of imago Dei can epitomise why the commercialisation of religion is both unethical, and lacking in Christian virtue ethics.