Notorious Nigerian witch-hunter to preach in the US

Religion • January 2012 • Views: 2,115

blog.newhumanist.org.uk

Helen Ukpabio is a Christian fundamentalist and a Biblical literalist. She uses her sermons, teachings and prophetic declarations to incite hatred, intolerance and persecution of alleged witches and wizards. Ukpabio claims to be an ex-witch, initiated while she was a member of another local church, the Brotherhood of Cross and Star. She later founded the Liberty Gospel Church to fulfil her ‘anointed mission’ of delivering people from witchcraft attack. Ukpabio organises deliverance sessions where she identifies and exorcises people mainly children of witchcraft. Headquartered in Calabar in Southern Nigeria, the Liberty Gospel Church has grown to be a witch hunting church with branches in Nigeria and overseas.

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9 comments

The Ghost of a Flea Sun, Jan 8, 2012 11:45:42am

This preacher's CV can be found on Barth's Notes on Religion. She's both a crook and a nut, and her focus in "witch hunting" is confining and torturing [abandoned] children whose parents claim they are witches. She has a goon squad that help her get her way, up to and including harassment of the secular child shelters that handle "witch children."

I follow this case because it's an index of what charismatic, signs-and-wonders fundamentalism looks like absent the stymieing force of a secular law enforcement and social welfare system. Since the preacher is the sole arbiter of spiritual and moral truth, Ukpabio and others like her have fiefdoms. It's like a hundred small Taiping Heavenly Kingdoms.

CuriousLurker Sun, Jan 8, 2012 11:58:06am

I'm currently in the middle of watching season three of The Tudors. Granted, it can hardly be considered historically accurate as many liberties were taken with actual events for the sake of entertainment, nonetheless it's been a good reminder of what life was like when the Church & absolute monarchs ruled.

The levels of deviousness, corruption & brutality were mind boggling, not to mention illiteracy & superstition, or the tenuousness of freedom, ability to earn a livelihood, and even life itself for the common people. Hell, it wasn't a whole lot better for the nobility if one found oneself on the wrong side of the monarch (or Church).

Kangaroo courts & trials on trumped up charges of heresy, witchcraft, and treason seem to have been the norm. Ditto for imprisonment, torture, beheading, burning at the stake, being drawn & quartered, boiled alive, any number of other horrors, or simply the cruel fate of you & your entire family being hung from the nearest tree or put to the sword as a warning to others to toe the line.

It's appalling, especially when you look at history and realize that the amount of time humans had to live under such conditions was far greater than the scant few centuries since the dawn of the Age of Enlightenment.

Sometimes I feel like people want to take us back to those days. That cannot be allowed to happen under any circumstances.

Charles Johnson Sun, Jan 8, 2012 12:15:14pm

re: #1 The Ghost of a Flea

This is a truly evil woman, but I'm sorry to say that I'm not surprised at all that there are actually "evangelicals" in the US who are drawn to her Dark Ages insanity. The religious right has been getting steadily more deranged in this country, for years, and they now have something like a separate society within American society, where the kids are home-schooled and kept separate from other children so they can be thoroughly brainwashed.

CuriousLurker Sun, Jan 8, 2012 12:35:41pm

re: #3 Charles

...a separate society within American society, where the kids are home-schooled and kept separate from other children so they can be thoroughly brainwashed.

There are Muslims who do this as well. The kids I've met are generally very polite, well-behaved, and score higher than normal on standardized tests (in places where they're required to take them), however they're usually also extremely naive and painfully socially awkward when required to deal with peers who've been educated in public (or regular private) schools. They simply aren't equipped to deal with the secular world outside their homes and/or immediate community. It can be a real problem when they reach reach college age and want to pursue higher education.

Achilles Tang Sun, Jan 8, 2012 5:16:52pm

re: #4 CuriousLurker

I recall a family down our street when our kids were young. They had 2 girls, I believe the same age as our daughters, but they never met even though we knew all the other children of similar age in the area.

I knew that they were home schooled, but I often wondered what went on in that house.

nines09 Sun, Jan 8, 2012 6:46:10pm

Because God loves YOU.

nines09 Sun, Jan 8, 2012 6:53:12pm

re: #4 CuriousLurker

When raised in a world where there is but ONE view, reality is harsh. I know kids who are still trying to catch up to reality thanks to mom and dad planning for the afterlife.

CuriousLurker Sun, Jan 8, 2012 6:59:05pm

re: #7 nines09

Yeah, it's really hard for them because they don't have the necessary skills to navigate the real world and recognize/avoid its pitfalls, so sometimes they end up in serious trouble.

CuriousLurker Sun, Jan 8, 2012 7:05:24pm

re: #5 Naso Tang

The parents mean well and want to protect their kids, but IMO they end up doing the opposite. I can only imagine how overwhelming it must be for them when confronted with all sorts of ideas & choices they've never been exposed to before (or which they've been taught to fear).

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