African Baptism Deaths: Where Was the Christian God?

In 2018, two cases where people died in the course of baptism should serve as some food for thought to African believers. In fact, the two incidents should get Africans to rethink their faith in God, at least in the Christian god. Let’s examine these cases. The first case happened in Ethiopia. According to a BBC report, a crocodile jumped and attacked a pastor while he was performing a baptism in a lake.

The pastor was bitten on his legs, on the back and hands. He later died as a result of the wounds that he sustained from the attack. The report states that, but for the fishermen, the crocodile would have taken away the body of the pastor. The men used their fishing net to stop the crocodile from escaping with the body. In Ghana, no crocodile attacked during the baptism. In fact, the pastor was safe. It was the person being baptized who died. The pastor immersed the church member in the river on two occasions. The man emerged the first time but on the second time, he could not. The man drowned.

The two cases should provoke African Christians to take a critical look at their Christian faith. African Christians should start asking very pertinent questions. First, where was the Christian god during the baptism processes in Ethiopia and Ghana? In the Ethiopia case, why didn’t Jesus stop the crocodile from attacking the pastor? Africans Christians believe that Jesus is the savior of the world. They regard, revere and worship Jesus as the savior of humankind. So why didn’t Jesus save the pastor, his own pastor who was performing a baptism? In fact, it was the fishermen who actually saved the situation and prevented the crocodile from taking away the body of the pastor?

So what does that tell African Christians about the assumed salvific power of the Christian god?  Are there such powers? Or are they a make-belief?

Look, what happened in Ethiopia is a typical case of a savior that could not save; an omnipotent being who was not powerful enough to stop a crocodile from attacking a pastor. Imagine, an ordinary crocodile, not even a shark, or a lion! A savior that could not save somebody baptizing in a river from being attacked or another being baptized from drowning, what kind of a savior is that?

African Christians expend so much resource worshipping the Christian god. They try to imitate Jesus by performing a baptism in a river and when tragedy strikes as it did in Ethiopia and Ghana, Jesus is nowhere to save them. Jesus is unable to come to their help. Is that not enough reason for African Christians to begin to question and to doubt the existence and power of this Jesus? So where was Jesus when the crocodile jumped and attacked a pastor during baptism? Was he sleeping? Did he go on a journey? Did he temporarily cease being omnipresent and omnipotent? Where was the Christian god when the fishermen were dragging the pastor’s body with the crocodile? Was Jesus unconscious? I mean how does one explain the fact that a cleric died in such a violent manner, and people still believe that there is an existing active god/saviour out there who deserves to be worshipped?

Leo Igwe

Leo Igwe (born July 26, 1970) is a Nigerian human rights advocate and humanist. Igwe is a former Western and Southern African representative of the International Humanist and Ethical Union, and has specialized in campaigning against and documenting the impacts of child witchcraft accusations. He holds a Ph.D from the Bayreuth International School of African Studies at the University of Bayreuth in Germany, having earned a graduate degree in Philosophy from the University of Calabar in Nigeria. Igwe’s human rights advocacy has brought him into conflict with high-profile witchcraft believers, such as Liberty Foundation Gospel Ministries, because of his criticism of what he describes as their role in the violence and child abandonment that sometimes result from accusations of witchcraft. His human rights fieldwork has led to his arrest on several occasions in Nigeria. Igwe has held leadership roles in the Nigerian Humanist Movement, Atheist Alliance International, and the Center For Inquiry—Nigeria. In 2012, Igwe was appointed as a Research Fellow of the James Randi Educational Foundation, where he continues working toward the goal of responding to what he sees as the deleterious effects of superstition, advancing skepticism throughout Africa and around the world. In 2014, Igwe was chosen as a laureate of the International Academy of Humanism and in 2017 received the Distinguished Services to Humanism Award from the International Humanist and Ethical Union. Igwe was raised in southeastern Nigeria, and describes his household as being strictly Catholic in the midst of a “highly superstitious community,” according to an interview in the Gold Coast Bulletin.[1] At age twelve, Igwe entered the seminary, beginning to study for the Catholic priesthood, but later was confused by conflicting beliefs between Christian theology and the beliefs in witches and wizards that are “entrenched in Nigerian society.”[1] After a period of research and internal conflict due to doubts about the “odd blend of tribalism and fundamentalist Christianity he believes is stunting African development,” a 24-year-old Igwe resigned from the seminary and relocated to Ibadan, Nigeria