Don tasks churches on balanced provision for congregants

Don tasks churches on balanced provision for congregants

Food

By Victor Adeoti

Ede (Osun), June 21, 2024 (NAN)  A Professor, Afe Adogame, has urged pentecostal and charismatic churches in Africa not to neglect provision of “physical food” for their congregants while satisfying them with the spiritual one.

Adogame, Professor of Religion and Society at Princeton Theological Seminary, New Jersey, United States, said this was imperative, especially with the harsh economic situation in Africa and the world at large.

He made the remarks at the maiden lecture series of Department of Religious Studies and Philosophy, Redeemer’s University(RUN), on Friday, in Ede, Osun.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the lecture had as its theme” Spiritual Ecologies and Moral Imaginaries in African Pentecostal Religioscapes”.

Adogame said that only one who is well-fed would truly enjoy and absorb spiritual food.

He urged religious institutions, including churches in Nigeria, to look into concrete investments and endowments that would deal with ‘stomach infrastructure’.

The don said that such investments should also address food security, job creation, sustainability and employability in the lives of the congregants.

He said this would assist the congregants to find security and contentment in the God they are taught to believe in.

Adogame said although it was paramount to take care of an individual’s spiritual well-being, physical needs should not be overlooked.

He said that institutions like RUN and the Redeemed Christian Church of God, which had already started integrating food production and real estate into their expansion strategies, could serve as model to other institutions and churches.

Adogame said that this would assist them to become ‘food baskets’ and ‘food laboratories’ to cater for not just their immediate environment but the larger society.

In his remarks, Prof. Oluremi Shadrach, the Vice-Chancellor of the university, appreciated the guest speaker for an apt delivery of the lecture.

He was represented by the institution’s Librarian Dr Akinniyi Adeleke.

Also, Prof. Babatunde Adedibu, the Head of Department of Religious Studies and Philosophy, discussed the topic “Despite the various religious activities, why is crime a menace in the society?”

Adedibu, the host, also appreciated the guest speaker.(NAN)
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Edited by Oluwole Sogunle