Famed worship leader Chris Tomlin has responded to pushback over his decision to tour with Hillsong United over the next few months in light of the multiple scandals that have rocked the Australian megachurch over the last two years, saying that he ‘knows their hearts; and that that he believes the shows will be ‘amazing.’
This is not the first tour that the two bands, considered evangelical worship royalty, have gone on together. During their time last year, they came under fire for offering pricey ‘VIP experiences’ that included perks like “PRE-SHOW PHOTO OPPORTUNITY WITH YOUR PARTY FROM THE ON-STAGE CATWALK TO COMMEMORATE YOUR NIGHT.” Amid sustained criticism, theyeventually canceled that sort of ticketing.
By all accounts, Tomlin is the more theologically solid of the two bands, though he is not without his issues, given the other artists he worships alongside. He has toured with or put on shows with troublesome performers such as Matt Maher (a practicing Roman Catholic idolater) and Kim Walker-Smith of Jesus Culture, the musical group belonging to the hyper-charismatic cult of perdition that is Bethel Church in Redding, California.
As far as distancing himself from them, Tomlin says he has no intention of bowing out and will see it through. Christian Post reports Tomlin telling Hillsong when they offered to release him from the tour:
’ No, if we’re going to do this, I think it’s going to be amazing. And I think it’s gonna really help people, and I’m with you guys.’”
Tomlin is committed, knows full well what he’s getting into.
From the time that we started to the time we actually went on tour, they were completely different, [Hillsong United] were in a completely different place.
…It wasn’t like I was touring with somebody I really don’t know; I’ve known [Jonathon ‘JD’ Douglass] forever. I’ve known Joel for so long, and I know their hearts. I know their hearts are broken just like everybody else’s. The only difference is they have to live it and get lumped in with all this media stuff, and they have to take the hits on that.”
Everybody goes through hard times, and life is hard, and life throws curves in many different ways…To stand there and say, ‘You know what, in the midst of that I worship you, God.’ I mean, that is the Bible. That’s the Scripture; that’s what we read.
The fact that he’s playing with Hillsong- a mega musical band in their own right that has dominated the worship scene for the last two decades and who is simply a vehicle to deliver the scandal-riddled organization’s own brand of wicked prosperity gospel and cauldron of blasphemies is an indictment against him. We’re not trying to kneecap the guy. Still, Hillsong is awful, and we regard every aspect of the Hillsong ecosystem designed to draw in Christians and expand their influence to be wholly and utterly demonic.
(Evangelical Dark Web) Russell Moore is officially the Editor-In-Chief at Christianity Today. Let the cringe commence or resume. This is Compromise Today, we are talking about. In one of the first cringe articles Russell Moore has written, he lays blame on conservatives for church divisions, calling their grievances ethnonationalist alt-right identity politics. Now, who does this describe? Don’t know.
Russell Moore wrote an article titled, “What Church Splits Can Teach Us About a Dividing America.” The premise of the article is that church splits predated the American Civil War which could be a prelude to our current political strife. However a key difference he articulates is that the divisions are not as clear cut as red and blue states because these states are hardly homogenous.
As many have pointed out, the idea of blue states and red states is not really accurate. California is blue, but what about Bakersfield? Texas is red, but what about Austin? Washington is blue, but what about Spokane? Louisiana is red, but what about New Orleans? And that reality is not just about urban areas in primarily rural states or the reverse. Even in the reddest part of America, at least a third of the people are blue, and vice versa.
However, when he discusses contemporary church divisions, Russell Moore is amazingly flaccid for…to continue reading click here.
Editor’s Note. This article was written by Ray Fava and published at Evangelical Dark Web
Rosaria Butterfield is the author of The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert and The Gospel Comes With a House Key. She’s one of the main go-to people for Christian leaders to point to as an example of the power of the gospel on account of being a lesbian Women’s Studies professor who was saved and having her sexuality redeemed. She ultimately married a man, had a family and turned aside from her wayward ways- being a shining success story in an ocean littered with failures.
We’ve scrapped with her over the years primarily because of ancillary perspectives on homosexual habits, including the use of personal pronounces relating to “Christian hospitality” and her occasionally boorish behavior towards our founder. While Butterfield’s LGBTQ theology is not as sub-biblical and theologically schizophrenic as Jackie Hill Perry, Rebecca McLaughlin, or Sam Allberry; three other mainstays in this space, we’re thankful that she has begun to button up some of her more wanton errors that we’ve previously criticized her for.
While Butterfield has, to her detriment, typically refused to “name names” of those causing theological chaos in her space, she has reserved some quiet criticism for Preston Sprinkle and his wretched book “Embodied,” having previously publicly criticized it. Now, she’s getting a bit more vocal, taking more shots at ‘Side B’ Christians and in particular, at the Revoice Conference in a Truth over Tribeguest post.
For some context, the whole notion of ‘Side A’ and ‘Side B’ Christians- ‘Gay Christians’ who embrace their homosexuality vs. ‘Gay Christians’ who believe homosexuality is a sin- was formulated 20 years ago on messages boards by the likes of Justin Lee and then later Matthew Vines as a way to categorize the incongruous and diverse voices on the matter now frequently found on the Spiritual Friendship page; a loose-knit coterie of sexually confused souls that frolic there.
After we are justified by God, we can never return to Adam. What does this mean for someone like me who lived as a lesbian for a decade and believed I was gay? It means that homosexuality is part of my biography, not my nature. My nature is securely chained in Christ (Colossians 3:10-20). What does it mean if a Christian falls back into an old sin pattern? It means that he is acting against his true nature. How do we stop acting against our true nature in Christ when our flesh craves our old sin patterns? By going to war with our sin through the power of Christ’s blood. A genuine Christian will not make peace with sin, for doing so scorns the atoning blood of Christ. Puritan Thomas Watson says, “Christ is never loved till sin be loathed.”
Taking Revoice to task for their merciless tribalism and hopeless, gospel-less ideologies, she concludes:
One dictionary definition of tribalism is “the behavior and attitudes that stem from strong loyalty to one’s own social group.” Tribalism is extra-biblical teaching. Tribalism comes from false ideas entering the church from the world. Tribalism is infectious and poisonous, and it leaves a wake of division in its path. It destroys the peace and purity of the church and produces false professions of faith as well as unstable Christians held captive to destructive sin patterns. Tribalism falsifies the blood of Christ.
Side B Christianity—Revoice—is tribal, not truthful. Instead of offering fundamental liberty in Christ, including redemption and change, Revoice theology denies the power of Christ’s blood to sanctify His people such that they no longer are homosexual. Revoice theology is tribal in its use of Freudian anthropology over biblical personhood, recording homosexuality as a morally neutral sexual orientation. But the Bible records both feelings and practices as sinful acts if directed against God’s commands (Matthew 5:27-28). Revoice theology is political in its embrace of LGBTQ+ language and ideology.Revoice theology believes that homosexual orientation cannot be repented of, thereby withholding the power of repentance and sanctification to transform lives. In contrast, Scripture teaches us to “repent…and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out” (Acts 3:19).
Because I choose Truth over tribe, I reject the false teaching of Revoice/Side B Theology.
As continuationists worldwide have once again failed to prophesy the death of Queen Elizabeth II, one charismatic prophetess is starting to sweat a little after a prophecy she made about prince Charles is about to be proven explosively wrong, demonstrating even more clear that she’s a false prophet who does not speak for God.
Julie Green is the associate pastor at Faith Family Fellowship and head of Julie Green Ministries. She believes she operates in the ‘office of the prophets’ and speaks directly from God to the people, daily recording and speaking out her words of the Lord, including that Trump will soon be restored to the presidency, Mitt Romney and Liz Cheney will be tried for treason, and that Nancy Pelosi and other prominent Democrats will die before the 2022 midterms.
Seven months ago, she prophesied that Charles would never have the royal crown, and now the wheels are spinning. In a September 9th discussion with Bo Polny, they discuss her statements:
“You will be stripped of your power and will never have the royal crown. You helped with the coup in my nation and the whole world will know it. Another arrogant pharaoh and you will fall. You are your own mother’s murderer. “
Green: “So people think that because that he’s already said, he’s been, you know, proclaimed king, well then that prophecy didn’t come to pass because he’s already king. Well he hasn’t had his coronation yet, and that is when he is designated “the professional day” or the whatever day- the day of celebration where he gets the crown, officially.”
Despite acceded to the throne on 8 September 2022, King Charles won’t have his coronation for a few more months, giving her time to think of a clever and fanciful way out of it.
The apex predator of the baby-killing world, Planned Parenthood, has released its 2020-2021 annual report and it’s as grisly as ever. The report reveals that despite the ravages of the pandemic, which saw some of their death mills at least temporarily shuttered, they killed a record breaking-number of little ones, growing almost all their services from the year before.
Plan Parenthood notes that they saw 2.16M patients and gave 8.65M services, including 372,000 Pap tests and breast exams, 2.19M birth control services, and 4.45M STI tests and treatments.
As far as abortions, they had their best year ever, murdering 383,460 children through surgical abortions, compared to 354,871 the year before.
They also dispensed 505,855 ’emergency contraception kits’ containing Plan-B and other abortifacient pills, and offered a paltry 2,667 adoption referrals, along with 8,775 prenatal services.
Editor’s Note. Not for nothing, but the fact that so many abortion clinics fought to stay open during the pandemic while so many churches folded and shut their doors is a damning indictment against them. While congregations saw their numbers crash, Planned Parenthood saw theirs soar.
In this week’s episode of the Sunday Show, ardent Roman Catholic and conservative commentator Matt Walsh explained to Ben Shapiro that the Protestant Reformation was essentially one big misunderstanding, while also denying faith alone.
Shapiro: From a religious point of view, when you say that the goal is to get to heaven, are you a belief- based person? I mean, is it that you believe in Christ and therefore you go to heaven, or is it a works-based thing? Because obviously, this is sort of a differentiator between Judaism and Christianity in some iterations.
Walsh: Yeah, I think, well, I don’t mean to dismiss like 500 years of fighting between Protestants and Catholics, but I kind of think that, at least between Protestants and Catholics, the works vs. faith dichotomy, it’s kind of a misunderstanding. Because I think we actually generally agree, in that I certainly don’t believe that the whole point of life is just to intellectually assent to the proposition that Jesus Christ is Lord and there is a God.
So people will say that all you have to do is believe in Jesus, all you have to do is believe in God. I definitely don’t believe that. But if we want to talk about faith, you have to put your faith in God. That is more than an intellectual exercise, that is something that you do with your whole life and your whole mind and soul and body; that you’re investing yourself in this belief.
And that includes works, but it’s not as though you know, you give a certain amount to charity, and you help old ladies across the street, you go to heaven, it’s not as simple as that. So it’s kind of a combination between the two.
The way that I see it is, it’s sort of like you know, if God is a bridge into heaven, into the afterlife, you can’t just walk up to the bridge and say, ‘Yes, I believe that the bridge is there. I assent to the existence of the bridge’, and then just go and sit on the other side of the bridge and not cross it. You actually have to trust the bridge and with your own effort, walk across it over the abyss. And so I think it’s sort of- that’s what faith is.
It’s not the first time that Walsh has commented on the split between Protestants and Roman Catholics, having formerly castigating Protestants for celebrating Reformation Day, which is when Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517.
For more of this thoughts, Walsh did an hour-long interview with Allie Beth Stuckey in 2019 on “the differing beliefs between Catholics and Protestants, heaven and hell, love and salvation” demonstrating that he doesn’t understand the scriptures, doesn’t know what the gospel is, and that his knowledge of the bible is terminally broken. This is perhaps best seen in his suggestion that because hell is the absence of God and therefore the absence of love, that people who ‘love well’ while on earth are possibly unable to even go to hell, even if they don’t specifically because in Jesus, and therefore will be saved.
Make no mistake, both Ben and Matt are lost and heading to hell, and they need our prayers.
SBTS President Albert Mohler got a little testy over the weekend, complaining that Canon Press, the publishing arm of Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho, has released some of his older material without his permission and blessing. His intent; distance himself from Wilson and the Church as much as possible.
Evidently a media platform has announced the release of some of my material. No communication with me or my staff. No permission from me. Material is taken from my addresses to Evangelical Theological Society. Take an aspirin, I’m not moving to Russia. Now or ever. #NYET
The books in question?
After this release was announced, some folk tweeted out their displeasure at Wilson platforming Mohler, bringing up Mohler’s flirtations with Critical Race Theory and his overall spiritual sponginess.
With a miffed Mohler’s grumbling about the betrayal, his sourness was quickly taken advantage of by the rowdy boys at Canon Press, grabbing his rebuke and running with it by offering a promo code in honor of Al’s lack of endorsement:
Plus a (well-deserved) potshot for good measure:
Responding to the brouhaha, Wilson weighed in, offering that the work Mohler produced prior to his new reality is useful and worthy of being shared, and that there was nothing untoward about the way they received and published his work.
A day or two ago, Canon+ added some of Al Mohler’s content from a number of years ago, from back before the woke virus days. A firestorm of sorts broke out on Twitter, with one gentleman commenting on how much the times have changed. Al Mohler and Douglas Wilson doing something together, and Wilson is the one who got into trouble. This was taken by some as a sign that Canon was going woke, or something like that, which is not the case at all. Al’s stuff back then was really good, and we stand behind it. Unlike Al, apparently.
But others in the comment thread following Al’s tweet were questioning whether or not it was an ethics issue. I can assure everyone that it is not an ethics issue. Everything published on the Canon+ app was acquired on the up-and-up, fair-and-square, and all-legal-like. Whoever was advising Al to put some distance between himself and Canon was a bit hasty, and ought to have done some spade work before telling Al to pull his skirts away.
In a recent podcast, former SBC president J.D Greear has apologized some controversial public statements he’s made in the past, walking back earlier infamous comment that “The bible appears more to whisper on sexual sin compared to its shouts about materialism and religious pride.” Much to the chagrin of other pastors who have stolen this line, such as Ed Litton, he explains that he would no longer explain it that way, and that he made a mistake it doing so.
Question: We’ve got a number of questions about a sermon you preached a few years ago, I think it was the Roman series, and you use the word ‘whispers’ in relation to how the Bible speaks about homosexuality. So can you explain what was happening in that statement? And would you still say that today?
Greear: Well, okay. Here’s the context. And by the way, the short answer is NO, and let me explain why. In a message on Romans 1:24-32…in January of 2019, here at the Summit Church, I said that in comparison to how Jesus talks about the sins of religious pride and greed, it’s as if God whispers about sexual sin, while he screams about pride and greed. It was a comparison by analogy.
Last year, because we got some questions about it and because on social media had been clipped and passed around, lifted a little bit out of context, I addressed it in a blog post and basically gave the answer that I’m going to give now. But it’s clear that a more direct explanation in this case is appropriate given the understandable concern that my words caused, especially when looked at in isolation there.
Like I said, at the very beginning, I regret the word choice. It was a rather clumsy way of making the point I was trying to make,that Jesus seemed to save his loudest thunder for religious hypocrites. That point is one that I stand by. But in the end, the language that I used to make that point, I think, in this case, probably obscured more than it illuminated.
…In my case, my words confused some on a very vital topic which desperately needs clarity today. At no point, I just to make this crystal clear, at no point was I trying to imply that sexual ethics are muted in Scripture, or that Scripture is unclear about them, that they’re less important or that we should not speak clearly and boldly about them or that we should be embarrassed by them.
And so whisper to each other about what the Bible says… that’s not what I was trying to say. I do seek to build bridges where I can, but I don’t believe that we should ever undermine the Bible’s teaching in order to do so.
He concludes:
…Failures and communication are almost always the fault of the communicator. That’s a burden that I and every other pastor in America carries into the pulpit each weekend. And so for any confusion that my wording may have caused, or for anybody who believes I muddled what the Bible makes clear, I do sincerely apologize, in that message, as well as many of the messages on either side of that one. I’ve been clear about the seriousness of sexual sin and I will continue to do that every time it arises in the passage I’m teaching.
Credit where credit is due. It’s good that Greear has altered his perspective on this, and we wanted to offer a full transcript for all the times we beat him up previously. Going forward, we won’t ding him on that statement anymore, but will take his updated one at his word. But while we’re on the topic, here’s a couple more things Greear can change and “crystalize’ his thinking on.
Note. The transcript has been lightly edited for clarity, such as removing ‘uhs’, ‘ums’, and repeating words. Please listen to the audio for the full unedited commentary.”
A new crop of charismatic young Christian ‘faith healers’ claim to exorcise ghosts and cure illnesses. But many question these ‘miracles’, and the way these ministries operate.
(The Print) Chandigarh: The emaciated man on a wheelchair throws his head back and contorts his face, his arms flailing, legs shaking. All eyes, though, are not on him but on ‘Prophet’ Bajinder Singh, or just ‘prophetji’, minister at the Church of Glory and Wisdom in Punjab.
In his late 30s to early 40s, and dressed in jeans and a blazer, Bajinder looks like a corporate executive on casual Friday, except that his self-assigned job that day is to banish the “evil spirit” that has supposedly taken away the man’s ability to walk.
“Do you believe you will be healed here? Do you believe?” Bajinder prods the man’s weeping wife. “Yes, I believe,” she sobs. Bajinder then whips around to the spellbound audience gathered at the venue. “Everyone, raise your hands and let the Holy Spirit work,” he urges. The crowd complies and Bajinder focuses his attention back on the wheelchair-bound man.
“Jesus, touch him!” Bajinder exclaims, and the man screams loudly. “Get up!” Bajinder commands the man. “Jesussssssss.”
The man rises.
The crowd explodes into rapturous hallelujahs, and right on cue, the band and singers waiting onstage launch into an upbeat devotional song. The catchy rhythm is too much to resist. So effective has the so-called healing been that the “patient” joins the pastor in a few bhangra-style steps to the thumping music and even does a little jog down the stage.
Screengrab of Bajinder Singh dancing with a formerly wheelchair-bound “patient” | YouTube/Prophet Bajinder Singh
Scenes like the one described above are not uncommon in the promotional videos shared on YouTube by Punjab’s controversial new crop of Christian ministries, run in private churches by self-styled ‘pastors’, ‘apostles’, and even a ‘prophet’.
These ministries, all of which promise miracle cures, are usually helmed by charismatic young men and women, most of whom are converted Christians who have retained their Hindu or Sikh names, albeit prefixed with a religious title.
The names of their establishments follow a template: Prophet Bajinder Singh Ministries, Apostle Ankur Yoseph Narula Ministries, Pastor Harpreet Deol Khojewala Ministries, Pastor Amrit Sandhu Ministries, Pastor Harjit Singh Ministries, Pastor Manish Gill Ministries, Pastor Kanchan Mittal Ministries, Pastor Davinder Singh Ministries, Pastor Raman Hans Ministries, and so on.
These pastors, looked upon as conduits of God, claim they can heal every possible disease and disability, exorcise ghosts, and even bring the dead to life. Their divine influence, according to them, also extends to helping people procure a visa, bag a job, find a spouse, have a baby, get a better political post.
There is no shortage of believers. At least half a dozen of these new ministries have a significant following, and their “healing and prayer” sessions draw crowds by the thousands. Some have branches in almost all the large cities and towns in the state.
This may be part of a larger trend. An earlier in-depth report by ThePrint detailed how Christianity is growing in Punjab, with many Dalits belonging to the Mazhabi Sikh and Valmiki Hindu communities choosing to convert in order to escape the oppressions of the caste system. In Punjab’s border areas, like Gurdaspur, small churches are even cropping up on rooftops. These developments have led the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee, which manages gurdwaras across Punjab and several other states, to launch a drive to ‘counter’ Christian conversions. Giani Harpreet Singh, jathedar (ordained leader) of the Akal Takht, the highest temporal seat of Sikhism, has even alleged that Christians are using both money and force to convert Sikhs.
The new faith-healing ministries claim they don’t want to convert people but only to cure them, but they too offer a sense of community and recourse from painful realities.
A sign of their growing influence is that in the run-up to the assembly polls, some of Punjab’s top politicians have visited these ministries’ churches for ‘blessings’ that they perhaps hope will convert into votes. Over the last couple of months, Deputy Chief Minister Sukhjinder Randhawa, state Congress chief Navjot Sidhu, cabinet ministers Rana Gurjit Singh and Pargat Singh, and a host of MLAs have registered their presence at congregational events.
However, several of these churches are mired in controversy, not just because of their outlandish — and potentially dangerous — claims and ‘healing’ practices, but because of alleged irregularities in their financial dealings, as well as concerns about the personal conduct of some prominent figures, one of whom, Bajinder Singh, is currently undergoing trial in a rape case.
‘Healing’, ‘exorcism’, baptism, prophecies
While these ministries claim that they are not trying to convert their followers to Christianity, and only “transforming their lives”, the prayer, healing, exorcism, baptism, and prophecy sessions are carried out in the name of the Holy Spirit in tune with Pentecostal church traditions.
All congregations are carried out in the name of Yeshu Masih (Jesus Christ), and everyone present is exhorted to join in with hallelujahs. The pastors deliver sermons from the Bible and sessions held outside the location of their church are called “crusades”.
Ministries also offer “babtisma (baptism)”, in which followers are made to take a dip in holy water.
The prominent ministries hold weekly, bi-weekly, and in some cases even daily prayer and healing sessions. These are heavily advertised through hoardings, banners, posters, pamphlets, and social media. Phone lines, called “prayer towers”, run round the clock to register those who will attend the sessions.
The sessions themselves are extravagant affairs, usually held under enormous tents or in acres of open grounds that quickly get filled up with men, women, and children, many of them poor and seeking help for health and other problems. The sharply dressed and well-groomed pastor presides over the crowd from a stage (for the most part), usually accompanied by his wife, who can sometimes do a bit of “healing” herself.
A Christmas gathering organised by Harpreet Deol Khojewala Ministries | Photo: Facebook/Pastor Deol Khojewala
These events typically begin with a choir singing Punjabi carols and dancing to a live band. The stirring music often arouses a high degree of emotion, rapture even, among the people gathered. Whatever the pastor commands them to do, they do: They wave their arms above their head, they fall to the ground, they shake, they writhe. It’s a display of complete surrender.
The big-ticket item of these spectacles, however, is when the pastor demonstrates “miracle healing” on the spot.
The YouTube channels of the ministries show pastors ostensibly restoring sight to the blind, liberating the wheelchair-bound, and making short work of cancers, cysts, and stones in the body. There are also mass “healings” through laying hands on people’s heads or spraying them with holy water.
‘Resurrecting the dead’ is another speciality. In one clip, Prophet Bajinder Singh claimed to bring a three-year-old child back from death. As singers chanted “Jehovah, Jehovah, Jehovah” to a crescendo, Bajinder lifted up the inert toddler and revived her with a few good splashes of water from a plastic bottle.
Apostle Ankur Narula trumped even this when he claimed to have reversed a miscarriage and brought a baby back to life in a woman’s womb. He told the audience that a rich mother would not have taken such a rewarding gamble on faith and would have instead wasted time in hospitals.
Also popular are exorcisms of various hues, including oils that supposedly banish evil spirits once you rub them on your body and say “holy ghost fire”, preferably in a trance-like state. More disturbing spectacles include the pastor grappling with “possessed” people, including children, to drive out demonic forces.
When a pastor casts out or “arrests” a spirit, rejoicing and frenzied dancing follows amid cries of “praise the Lord” and “hallelujah”.
Gawahi (testimonies) by those who have been “healed” or whose wishes have come true are also a big part of these sessions. Occasionally, the benefits of sowing the seed (donating) are also shared by people claiming to have received high returns in the form of a well-paid job or other successes.
A ‘healing’ ritual at Amrit Sandhu Ministries | Photo: Twitter/@PastorAmrit
There are also prophecy sessions, where pastors make predictions about the future or claim credit for events that they say they foresaw, including the misfortunes of Bollywood stars or natural disasters.
Every minute of every event is carefully orchestrated, with hundreds of volunteers and ministry employees managing the crowds and the stage.
Multiple cameras capture every miracle, with the videos later uploaded on the ministries’ social media handles. The top ministries have lakhs of followers on YouTube and Facebook, and some sessions, particularly those of faith healing, gather millions of views (here, for example).
When ‘healing’ goes wrong
There have been reports about these so-called miracle healers asking patients to leave their ongoing treatment, sometimes resulting in worsening of their condition or even death, but very few complaints have reached the police.
In April 2021, however, a Mumbai family complained to police in Punjab that Prophet Bajinder Singh Ministries had charged them Rs 80,000 to treat a 17-year-old girl who was suffering from cancer. After she died, the ministry staff demanded more money offering to bring her back to life, the complaint alleged.
According to Sukhpal Singh Randhawa, deputy superintendent of police (DSP) in Kartarpur, investigations are still ongoing. “We are recording the statements of the complainants and gathering evidence,” the DSP told ThePrint.
There are concerns also that these faith-healing ministries are promoting superstition for profit at the cost of their followers’ wellbeing.
Megh Raj Mittar, the founder of the Tarksheel Society, a rationalist organisation, said it was regrettable that even politicians were encouraging such ministries.
“Superstition is being promoted to earn money. It suits everyone, including those who should be acting against them. The only way that people can be stopped from falling into these traps is to encourage rational thinking and scientific temper,” he said.
Hemraj Steno, the in-charge of the Punjab chapter of the Tarksheel Society, made similar points. “These healers are frauds. We will pay them Rs 5 lakh if they can bring a dead person to life or restore the eyesight of a blind person — provided we bring the body or person, and they perform the ‘miracle’ publicly,” he said, adding that it was a pity that the government was not bringing faith healers to task. “For politicians, these people become vote banks.”
Steno said superstitious beliefs abound across religions, and they all should be countered.
Murky funds, no regulatory mechanism
Many ministries claim that prayers are offered for free, but followers are encouraged during gatherings to “sow the seed in the church”, which means to donate. Donations are also openly solicited through the ministries’ buzzing social media accounts.
There are indications that at least some ministries are raking in the cash. According to an August 2021 Punjab intelligence report accessed by ThePrint, the two top ministries — Prophet Bajinder Singh Ministries and Apostle Ankur Yoseph Narula Ministries — both based in Jalandhar, collectively received over Rs 60 crore in their bank accounts in the past five years. Ankur Narula Ministries received Rs 36 crore and Bajinder Singh Ministries Rs 24.5 crore; Harpreet Deol Khojewala Ministries, the report added, received Rs 5.42 crore.
ThePrint made several attempts to contact Ankur Narula and Bajinder Singh through phone calls and text messages, but there was no response from them.
John Kotli, the president of the Pentecostal Masih Mahasabha (council of Pentecostal preachers), Punjab, who claims to be a close aide of Narula, said prayer meetings are generally attended by poor people who do not donate more than Rs 10 or 20 per head.
“Whatever donation is collected, and it could be Rs 36 crore as you have mentioned, is used to do a lot of social service,” he said.
Prophet Bajinder Singh rings in the new year with a song and dance spectacle | Photo: Facebook/Prophet Bajinder Singh Ministries
Nevertheless, the top pastors flaunt a lavish lifestyle, complete with fancy clothes, big cars, and elaborate private security. According to the intelligence report, they are also buying property across the state to build more private churches for their ministries.
In November and December alone, new branches of top ministries opened in Jalandhar, Patiala, Pathankot, Mohali, Zirakpur, Nawanshahr, Nakodar, Rajpura, and Ludhiana.
These burgeoning ministries function independently and are not affiliated to either of the two mainline churches in the region: the Church of North India (CNI), which has under it the majority of Protestant churches in North India, and the Diocese of Jalandhar, under whose jurisdiction come Roman Catholic Churches in 15 out of 23 of Punjab’s districts, as well as four districts in Himachal Pradesh.
Dr Pradip Kumar Samantaroy, bishop of Amritsar Diocese (under CNI), told ThePrint that these “independent churches” are answerable to no one except themselves. He also compared them to deras — religious sects that operate outside mainstream Sikhism but have huge mass followings.
“They represent dera culture in Christianity. In the beginning, when wandering preachers and faith healers started out, they were driven by a genuine desire to serve and heal. But now what we see seems to be driven by commercial interests,” he said.
“I have been the moderator of the CNI, which has 27 dioceses with it across almost three-fourths of India, but nowhere else have I seen this scale (of operations) of independent churches (as in Punjab),” added the bishop.
Samantaroy said he is concerned about the fact that the ministries seem to be “seeking money in the name of healing”. That is why, he said, he thinks of the ministries as “fake healers not faith healers”.
A regulatory mechanism to monitor the functioning of these ministries is the need of the hour, the bishop said.
“There are two aspects to this. First is the religion, the faith, its teachings and practice. Second is the system or discipline or order which should be both transparent and accountable. All church orders should come together and create a mechanism to regulate the functioning of these ministries,” he said.
Father Peter Kavumpuram, public relations officer of the Roman Catholic Jalandhar Diocese, told ThePrint that these ministries worked independently and had no ties to the diocese. “We do not interfere with their work; we are concerned only with our own churches,” he said.
“If they (the ministries) do anything fundamentally against the doctrine of the church or the dogma or the faith, naturally they will be countered. Until then, what they are doing is for their conscience to (guide). They are answerable to those who believe in them,” Kavumpuram added.
In 2019, the state’s Christian community made an attempt to regulate the functioning of these ministries with the setting up of the Shiromani Church Parbandhak Committee (SCPC), but it was short-lived.
Albert Dua, president of the Christian United Federation, Punjab, was instrumental in creating the SCPC, but told ThePrint that the body is currently “non-functional” because “no consensual decision could be taken” due to differences among the members.
“We are aware of what these ministries are doing and we receive a lot of complaints as well, but there is nothing much that we can do until we have the authority to take action,” he said.
Lavish New Year’s Eve celebrations at Apostle Ankur Narula Ministries | Photo: Facebook/Ankur Narula Ministries
Dua believes the state government should collaborate with churches and Christian bodies to set up a regulatory body to monitor the ministries, but he does not have high expectations.
“We are observing that instead of strengthening mainline churches or traditional Christian bodies, government representatives are patronising these ministries,” Dua said.
Currently, the closest thing there is to a monitoring body is the Pentecostal Church Parbandhak Committee (PCPC), set up in November 2021 by the Pastor Harpreet Deol Khojewala Ministries. The aim of this body is to help self-regulate the ministries.
“If anyone has any complaint to give about anyone, please let us know,” Khojewala announced during the launch of the PCPC.
Kuldip Mathew, senior pastor at Church of Hope in Ferozepur and a member of the executive of the PCPC, told ThePrint that 980 organisations have already registered with the body. “If there is a complaint against anyone, we conduct an inquiry into the matter and then discuss the issue with other members. If there is need for any action to be taken, we do that,” Mathew said.
Transparency, though, is a long way away.
Very little is known about the functioning of these ministries other than what they choose to share on their websites and social media accounts.
In addition to Bajinder Singh and Ankur Narula, ThePrint tried to contact all the other popular pastors — including Harpreet Deol, Amrit Sandhu, Manish Deol, Kanchan Mittal, Raman Hans, Davinder Singh, and Harjit Singh — through calls and messages, but no one responded.
Top ministries, some controversial leaders
Apostle Ankur Narula Ministries, on its website, claims to be the “biggest and the fastest growing church ministry in Punjab”. With its home base in the Church of Signs and Wonders in Khambra village, Jalandhar, it claims to have almost three lakh members.
Its leader, Ankur Narula, comes from a Hindu Khatri business family, and professes to be a recovered drug addict. According to his website, Narula “came to know about Lord Jesus Christ at suicide point frustrated from intoxications and sickness. He surrendered himself to God for the gospel and started his ministry with 3 people in the church in the year 2008…”
The site further declares that Narula now “preaches the good news of Jesus Christ to a congregation of more than 100,000 people every week in the Church of Signs and Wonders”.
It adds that “through miracle services, conferences, TV broadcasts, the Internet, printed page (Masihi Sansar), and audio-video recordings”, Narula’s message now inspires “thousands of people around the globe”. Narula’s was one of the first ministries in Punjab to command a significant following.
Many other upcoming ministries of pastors like Amrit Sandhu, Harjit Singh, Pankaj Randhawa, and Pawan Chohan have declared that Narula is their spiritual father and that they are following in his footsteps.
This January, Narula will also start a mentorship programme for pastors.
According to Yunus Masih, a pastor working with the Ankur Narula Ministries, the church works purely for “charity”.
“We give rations, help in marriages of the poor — every penny is accounted for. We work solely on voluntary donations. There is no fee for healing or other services. And there is no conversion of anyone’s religion,” Masih told ThePrint.
As mentioned earlier, Apostle Ankur Narula Ministries has come under the scanner about its funds, and it has also faced backlash from Hindu Right-wing organisations.
In November 2020, the Legal Rights Observatory, an RSS-affiliated group, claimed in a Twitter thread that it had lodged a complaint with the Union home ministry against Narula for alleged violations of the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act (FCRA).
The group alleged that Narula had created a shell company in the UK for ten days and then dissolved it with a view to set up a “money laundering network”.
On 23 November, Narula opened a Delhi branch of his church, which was allegedly vandalised by members of the Bajrang Dal a week later, and has stayed shut since then. While an FIR was lodged against the miscreants, the ministry’s staff were also booked for violating the requirements of the Disaster Management Act by holding large gatherings without social distancing.
The sixth album in this year’s series showing our brothers and sisters in Christ gathering for church service as faithful believers.
While going to church does not make one a believer, refusing to faithfully attend a local church should seriously call that faith into question. This is a glimpse of what the global church is up to, and will feature images in chronological order, week to week, of the men and women being obedient to the scriptures. As always, click pictures to enlarge.
For our multi-volume series showing the progression of the Church worldwide experiencing the lockdown and pandemic, from March 2020- July 2021, click here.
