The nation’s attention has been riveted to news of the alleged shenanigans coming out of the Pathways International Kingdom Restoration Ministries in Montego Bay, St James, which culminated in the death of its leader Kevin Smith.

In an age when blood-curdling events are reduced to nine-day wonders, some readers may have forgotten that in 2019 the Qahal Yahweh Group, also located in Montego Bay, grabbed media headlines when the security forces raided the compound where it was alleged members, including children, were being subjected to unspeakable atrocities.

Going back to 1998, it was alleged that the pastor of Angels of God Sabbath Church on Mountain View Avenue in the Corporate Area mentally manipulated the membership into believing their lives were at risk of being lost in an impending flood and instructed them to take refuge on the church’s compound. These sordid stories are becoming too frequent in Jamaica to be ignored.

Jamaica is reputed to have the most churches per square mile in the world. It did not get that way because we are the most committed adherents to Christian belief and dogma. Many new congregations are breakaways from mainstream denominations. These groups are invariably headed by self-appointed, untrained, unsupervised fanatics claiming to have heard from God. False prophets who indoctrinate their followers making them into subservient zombies.

Some mainstream church leaders and their congregations are themselves guilty of doctrinal malpractice.

The door to cult-like practices was swung wide open by what the late Jamaican Bible scholar and author Tony Williamson described as “the church’s pathological fixation with legalism”. I quote from his book titled Law and Grace: “Liturgical churches have a whole set of extra-biblical rules, which seem to appease their thirst for laws. Most denominations make their own rules, the vast majority of which are quasi-biblical and some near heresy.”

In trying to understand cults and cultic behaviour it is important to know there is nothing that makes religion naturally disposed to this abhorrent behaviour.

A cult is centred around the leader who requires total devotion from followers; snares them with a charismatic personality and feigned affection; and portrays himself/herself to be the supreme defender against outsiders with ulterior designs on the group. With that kind of narcissistic personality at the helm, one can make a cult of any group.

Every well-intentioned leader of a religious denomination or congregation should read God’s Generals — Why They Succeeded and Why Some Failed. The author, Roberts Liardon, chronicles the lives of twelve undoubtably anointed leaders of the Christian Church — God’s generals — many of whom started out on a firm footing, but fell along the way. Like the mythical figure Icarus, whose wings, made of feathers and wax, melted when he flew too close to the sun, their unbridled ambition and unrestrained passion led to their eventual downfall.

What is there in the nature of man that makes him go from zealously leading unbelievers to trusting an infinite God to taking on to himself/herself the very nature and power of God? We may never fully unlock the answer to this age-old mystery but by studying the rise and fall of some of the most ardent proponents of the gospel we gain insight to the inducements that can entrap, ensnare, and destroy religious leaders, and scatter their trusting followers.

The first story in the book, God’s Generals, is that of John Alexander Dowie: The Healing Apostle. Born May 2, 1847 in Edinburgh, Scotland, he succeeded in shaking the world at the turn of the century, primarily through divine healing.

Maybe because of a childhood wracked by sickness, Dowie, a reformer and revivalist, developed a strong antipathy to medicine and surgery, but had a fervent belief that the God who heals from diseases is the same God yesterday, today, and for evermore. Over the life of his ministry, starting in Scotland, moving to Australia, and culminating in Chicago, his recorded converts numbered in the millions, of which thousands were spectacularly and verifiably healed under his ministry.

In Chicago, the meteoric rise of his Zion Tabernacle led to the lease of the largest auditorium in the city at that time to hold services. Ultimately, he realised his vision of Zion City, a 6,600-acre commune over which he presided as self-appointed and self-titled high priest and general city overseer.

As Dowie advanced in age, success, and influence, he became increasingly preoccupied with his growing number of detractors and the affairs of State, which drew his attention away from his original apostolic calling. He grew delusional and isolated. His followers became financially destitute because of the constant requirement for them to invest in his oversized ego and ambition. Bereft of finances, the City of Zion failed.

The tragic end came when Dowie developed a complex, believing himself to be the modern-day Elijah.

During the sermon that would be his last, he suffered a stroke while declaring, “The millennium has come; I will be back for a thousand years.” Despite his many victories for the kingdom, Dowie went down in history as a psychotic and an impostor.

Those of us who knew Kevin Smith in his “establishment years” are left to ponder what happened in the “middle passage” between then and his demise en route to Kingston to face murder charge for the ritualistic death of two of his congregants. The caricature that emerged was anything but Christ-like and must be repudiated from pulpit to pew.

The object lesson to be learnt from the life of John Alexander Dowie and the likes of Kevin Smith is, those of us called to be leaders in the Church must shun the very appearance of cultic practices and remain with the original, anointed plan of God for the duration of our lives.

Let them who have ears to hear, hear.

hmorgan@cwjamaica.com