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Back in the village, in the land of milk, honey and dust or Guruve, cow dung naturally attracts flies. There, flies don’t hover much around honey than they do over cow dung. In the abnormal, the fetid is more attractive than the delicious!

Back in the village, matters of religion and religiosity, the art and the execution of the belief conjure emotions. Many people puttering in Churchianity actually think they are dabbling in Christianity. The two are far too different. Worlds apart!

The greatest part of Zimbabweans practice Churchianity and not Christianity. In Christianity, Jesus Christ is the life, the principal, the harbinger of life and love, the embodiment of righteousness: the visionary and cleanser of all evil. Jesus Christ is the moralist, the epicentre of everything.

In Churchianity, the church is the cynosure, the pastor, prophet and prophetess is the supreme epicentre — the all-important. The pastor, prophet and prophetess — usually smartly dressed and living larger-than-life but has another earthly “godfather” in Ghana or Nigeria, who ironically is not Jesus Christ or God. It is from the earthly godfather that the prophet, pastor or prophetess derive their powers. Every year, they religiously go back to their godfathers for more powers. They pay for the powers. Is this Christianity? No, never!

In Churchianity, prophetic powers appear sexually transmitted, for, the prophet’s wife suddenly gets healing powers. Karitundundu, the ageless village autochthon of wisdom and knowledge has always asked if God anointed between the sheets.

In Churchianity, the whole set up becomes family business. The prophet and his family become gospreneurs. They come up with a business model that abuses Christ and uses Christ’s name as a smokescreen behind which they hide their systematic milking dry of the poor, troubled and gullible. So powerful are their sermons, the sort of hullabaloo that makes the poor part with the last cent as they seek deliverance.

While the prophet, prophetess and pastor hires bodyguards who move around them in muscle-hugging suits and dark glasses, the congregants are told that anointing oil and wristbands would protect them. My foot! Why is the prophet, prophetess or pastor not protected by the same? Why do they need five or six armed bodyguards? This villager will not be fooled.

Back in the village, the genuine spirit mediums are protected by the spirit. They have no bodyguards. Maybe Karitundundu, Dumburechuma, Dandajena, Chingowo, Mutota, Tsenge and Kangamiti are not businesspeople and do not need this protection. They are not gospreneurs and their protection comes from the spiritual realm.

Don’t be afraid on behalf of this villager. It is all about courage. Its all about serving and saving the nation. This villager is not Christian, so it works. If this villager was William Shakespeare, he would have written, “Fear not M’cbeth for no man born of woman shall ever do hard to thee.” But this villager is just the villager from Guruve. Nothing less nothing more.

Many genuinely upright people have their ideas and reservations about Churchianity but are afraid of saying what they think for fear of retribution. I have no fear. I am not in that league.

This villager, the son of the soil, is not one of those so scared to explore, shoulder high, the belief and the art. This villager is not scared to wade into the deepest waters of religion and religiosity into Christianity and Churchianity.

Churchianity is attracting more people than Christianity. Do village elders not say, cow dung naturally attracts flies?

In Zimbabwe, the spiritual realm has been filled with fly-by-night prophets, whose authenticity is not known. They make money, build big business empires and this is precisely the reason why the Zimbabwe revenue Authority should quickly come up with a mechanism to tax them.

This villager does not need an economist to prove that the Pentecostal churches are making profit. These have become the most profitable organisations. These churches have become the Blue-chip companies.

Gone are the days when our people and Government should not be hoodwinked into thinking the Pentecostal churches are charitable organisations.

Unlike the conventional churches that built schools and hospitals that have saved millions of people, these ones specialise in false prophecy and lure people with a hodgepodge of miracles. Most of the miracles like refuelling cars, miracle money, miracles babies and many nonsensical things are used as baits to gullible people who end up paying through their nose.

They come up with miracles and prophecies that are irrelevant to the national question. Miracles that have nothing to do with national issues. Miracles that deride our humanism, our Africanism and indeed insult our history and people. Miracles that defecate on existentialism of the values that brought our independence and even ourselves into being. The silly miracles that sire miracle babies in three days when Jesus Christ himself was born on normal gestation. Karitundundu wee!