A group of influential Christian business-men who are aiming to address corruption in all spheres of the society says churches should allow for the same level of scrutiny of their financial records as other public entities.

The men were part of a team, which included South African businessman Graham Power, who was recently in Jamaica sharing how his use of biblical principles has assisted in his financial success, and encouraging the island’s business, church and political leaders to join his international campaign promoting ethical behaviour.

Addressing the Jamaica Observer Press Club, local business operator and chairman of Wycliffe Bible Translators Caribbean Oral McCook said people are kept in check by the support system around them.

“So… whether it is a business person, a pastor or any group which operates without proper oversight, it is quite likely that they can go off track,” MCook said.

He noted that in Jamaica, where there is a proliferation of denominations, it becomes even more pronounced for financial scrutiny as there are many churches which have become outgrowths of others because they sometimes cannot operate under authority.

This, he said, is the challenge that churches face both in Jamaica and elsewhere.

“More and more we are going to be asking the churches to allow their accounts to be scrutinised, and I think the new Charities Act that is being imposed will put a lot of that in place, which I think is necessary,” McCook said.

He said further that where organisations don’t self regulate there might be need for regulation to be brought to bear.

According to McCook, a number of small churches have been founded by persons who basically got a call and started without an umbrella group to manage and put in place due process for them and, inadvertently, those organisations go off track.

McCook, commenting on the touchy issue of taxation, said if a church is considered to be a charity it should have all the benefits that accrue to such an entity, but this should not be without accountability.

“To qualify for this (tax exemption) they need to do what is necessary, which is to ensure their accounts are up to date and they are accountable for what they do and that they are monitored to ensure it is not used as a route to move benefits across the table,” said McCook.

“I think the church needs to open itself to that scrutiny and, at the same time, they should benefit from being a collective group owned by the people technically and should benefit from some of the benefits that accrue to charitable organisations,” he noted.

Meanwhile Power, the South African business mogul, said there is no doubt that power corrupts.

“We know that the challenges facing especially men is money, sex and power and whether that be as church leaders, business leaders or political leaders I think that is the kind of things we need to be concerned with,” he said.

A key issue, according to Power, is that pastors are not aware of the types of challenges facing the congregation and as a result they never address these issues.

“If a businessman is doing something unethical, the last person he would talk to about it is his pastor because he would feel ashamed, and so I think there is an awareness that needs to be created about things like these,” according to Power.

Power said while the South African churches also do not pay taxes, churches ought to abide by certain rules and regulations.

“There needs to be certain rules as everybody will form a quasi kind of church,” he said.

Michael Jones, a vice-president at Scotiabank and pastor at Christian Life Fellowship said the church must be willing to admit when it is wrong and to know how to say sorry.

“Everybody makes mistake and Christians make mistakes, too, but what is very important is that the church leads the way in putting up its hands and say we are sorry,” said Jones.

“Where there is a need for a public kind of repentance is saying ‘this is where we were wrong and this is the directional change that we regard as being necessary’. But there is a lack today of a lot of that in the country where people are afraid to put up their hands to acknowledge wrong doing,” Jones said. The church, he said, has a grand opportunity to demonstrate that type of leadership.