Two days after it was reported that Anita
Oyakhilome had filed for divorce, Christ Embassy deleted her pictures and
personal information from its official website, www.christembassy.org.
Many describe the action as the beginning of a
process to shut her out of the church, after she accused her husband of
“adultery” and “unreasonable behaviours” in a divorce suit filed in London last
April but only made public on Friday.
Christ
Embassy’s new website now shows only Pastor Chris Oyakhilome, with a broad
smile welcoming his followers to the month of August, and tagging it, ‘Month of
Praise’.
In the
message on the website, Oyakhilome also urges his followers to “rejoice for the
joy of the Lord is your strength.”Continue..
Also, on the
website of the Rhapsody of Realities, a daily devotional co-authored by the
esrtwhile couple, there’s nothing to show that Anita is still recognised as the
only visible face on the website among the family members is that of her
husband.
It was too
early to know if the September edition of the Rhapsody of Realities still has
the photographs of both the pastor and his wife as it used to be.
In the past,
when the going was good, Anita and Chris Oyakhilome held hands on the church
website and smiled broadly. They projected the image of a perfect couple.
But P.M.NEWS
checks at the weekend revealed that there is confusion in the church following
the divorce suit filed by Anita to end her over two decades marriage to the
founder of Christ Embassy Church.
In the past,
Pastor Chris headed the Nigerian branch of the church, though he travelled to
other branches occasionally, while Anita headed the branch in London and its
environs.
Christ
Embassy and its founder have been embroiled in a myriad of controversies in the
past. In 2010, Oyakhilome was accused of engineering a money laundering scheme
in Nigeria, and questions swirled around his finances because of his glamorous
lifestyle.
Many pastors
and theologians also excoriated Oyakhilome for his “New Creation” doctrine—a
form of gnosticism that says after a person becomes a Christian, any sin they
commit is only in the body and will not affect the spirit.
In 2008,
Oyakhilome’s reputation as a faith healer was tarnished badly in Johannesburg,
South Africa, when a man told a Soweto newspaper that Christ Embassy offered
him more than $1,200 to sit in a wheelchair and pretend to be crippled until
Oyakhilome prayed for him.
“The man
went to the media instead of taking the money, sparking concerns that healings
were being faked to impress growing crowds,” said Lee Grady in an article in
2012 published by Charisma Magazine.
Pastor Chris
Oyakhilome has also been a target of criticism by the Treatment Action Campaign
for his support of faith healing to cure HIV.
Allegations
that Christ Embassy members are reportedly being forced to give huge sums of
money in offerings with the biggest donors receiving the biggest awards have
left many people concerned.
Many
Nigerians have also alleged that the church operates like a cult and pressures
members to marry only within Christ Embassy.
Many people
also remember the scandal involving Christ Embassy and Sheraton Hotel some
years ago when a member of the church, who worked at the Sheraton Hotel, stole
money from his employers and gave it to Christ Embassy. But when Sheraton
approached the church for reimbursement, the church allegedly claimed that the
money had been given to God and could not be refunded.
Many also
excoriated Pastor Chris some years ago when the church began collecting gate
fees from members for their New Year Eve’s Service.
More
recently, Oyakhilome came under attack after he claimed that Christians were
free to masturbate because it was not a sin.
But the
latest scandal involving Anita and Chris, who have two daughters, seems to
threaten the very existence of one of the biggest churches in Nigeria.
Christ
Embassy runs several arms including the Healing School, Rhapsody of Realities,
and an N.G.O called the Innercity Missions as well as three Christian
television channels: LoveWorld TV, LoveWorld SAT and LoveWorld Plus.
The church
is scattered all over the world, including in the United Kingdom, the United
States, South America and the whole of Europe.
Culled PMNews
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