Faith guides Seychelles pilgrims through fiery chaos |01 December 2017

Many parts of Kenya were literally burning from political fires during the third week of this month, when a team of 10 Christians left Mahé for Nairobi to attend a major meeting.

Going by sight and to other people, the venue was perfectly “wrong” because the East Africa Convention of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) was being held in Karen area, the political stronghold of opposition leader Raila Odinga.

Only a few kilometres from there and towards the city, are the Kibera slums where impoverished residents have nothing to lose and were busy engaging the Kenyan Police with stones and knives in protests. Many were killed, reports said.

To go from the conference venue – the Catholic University of East Africa – to their residence in their up-class area of Hurlingham, the delegates had to go round the entire slum area.

Probably unbeknown to them, the Mbagathi Road they used to cover the short distance is usually the busiest during Kenya’s worst moments.

After the slums is the armed forces memorial hospital. Half a kilometre away is the country’s biggest mortuary to the left, and the morgue of East Africa’s biggest hospital on the right. The national (Kenyatta Hospital) itself faces the major Nairobi Hospital, but alas, the picture does not get brighter, for indeed, unbeknown to the delegates, the high walls near where they stayed circumvent the Kenya Army headquarters.

The timing could not have seemed more wrong in the eyes of men:

A Kenyan court had nullified the election of President Uhuru Kenyatta and at the request of the opposition, ordered fresh elections, which Odinga boycotted and promised there would be chaos.

Kenyatta was re-elected but again Odinga had sought another nullification by the courts and the judgment on his petition was to be delivered when the convention was going on, and it was sparking new violence. Clashes between the police and the opposition supporters continued and more lives were lost.

The verdict in favour of Kenyatta was delivered during the same period.

In view of the risks, 20 Seychellois were among 120 delegates who missed a well-prepared Harm Reduction Conference, which was due to take place at the relatively safer Kenya School of Monetary Studies.

When cancelling the Harm Reduction Conference, the organisers told delegates:

“The cancellation has been necessitated by the events following the elections in Kenya. This creates some uncertainties in the near future, which may expose the conference participants to political related insecurity.

“Considering the safety of conference participants in the Kenyan capital, and also the possibility of travel advisories, participation of international guests is likely to be affected. It was found necessary to postpone the conference to enable smooth and uninterrupted management of the conference.”

Pilgrims’ weapon

So, if everybody else feared going to Kenya, as police used guns and protesters burned tyres and wielded stones and big knives, what weapon did the Christians have?

“We were fully covered by the blood of Jesus,” one of them said.

Another one explained that from the day they arrived to the day they left, the delegates entered into “dry fasting and prayer”, which meant no food and no drink for the entire week.

“Prayers under such conditions are the most powerful,” they said, noting that the main purpose was not just the shielding of the delegates from temporary upheavals, but were meant to seek divine guidance as eight out of 16 Seychellois were ordained as deacon(esses).

The RCCG gave names of those ordained as Juliana Estico, Micheline Cole, Sandra Nanty, Collins Labiche, Françoise Labiche, Marie Belize, Elizabeth Thande and Lisette Samson.

“A total of 16 leaders were to be ordained as pastors or deacon(esses) during the event but the other eight could not make it due to work commitments,” RCCG overseer for Seychelles and Reunion Pastor Terence Payet said.

The convention was presided over by the megachurch’s assistant general overseer for administration & personnel Pastor Johnson Odesola, who is based in Nigeria.

The Seychelles team was led by Miss Cole, and escorted from here by a retired senior pastor from the RCCG's Lagos headquarters. They returned to Mahé on Tuesday last week after their weeklong convention.

The church has shared the pictures published here, showing the serious and fearless Christians in prayer and photo poses (Photos courtesy of Atinuke Oladokun/RCCG).

Contributed