Bishop Neofitos Kongai is the head of the Nyeri and Mt Kenya Diocese of the Orthodox Church. He talks about his fears and hopes for 2022.
What sets your church apart from other Christian faiths?
Our Church is historical. It dates back to 33AD from Christ Himself and the apostles. Our Church is Christ-centred and apostolic in nature. That is to say our connection from Christ to the holy apostles to the current priests and bishops of our church have continued unchanged. Mark the Apostle came to Africa and ordained the first bishop who then ordained others. That continuity has not been broken till date. Therefore, our church is Christ instituted and hierarchical in nature. The church is not a human institution, it’s not personal property.
Why is it that independent churches rarely attract the well-educated and well to do?
I don’t think so, we preach to all and invite all to receive Christ and be baptised. The educated and non-educated belong to this one big family called Church. Our main challenge is that we do not have programmes or institutions where the educated can find their space and place hence are absorbed by other institutions. We are turning a corner though as orthodox whereby we are creating institutions and restructuring our church for our own professionals to be accommodated. Lastly, most of our clergy given the level of their education didn’t want the educated to be close to them because they felt threatened or intimidated. But right now, we have clergy who are educated to PhD level.
Why is the headquarters of your church in Nyeri and not Nairobi?
Nyeri and Mt Kenya diocese is an independent jurisdiction on its own. Nairobi is a metropolis on its own and has its headquarters in Nairobi. For many years, there was only one headquarters in Nairobi but with the creation of new dioceses, things have changed. Every jurisdiction has its headquarters and its own ruling bishop
Every village in most parts of Africa has a church but not a nursery school or health clinic. Why is this so?
Building of churches was given the first priority in previous years. However, in recent years, there is a paradigm shift and we are focusing on schools and clinics. We have been able to build several of them within Nyeri and the whole of Kenya in general.
The church is increasingly becoming a place for children and the elderly. Why are youths shunning religion?
The youth in the church is a powerful force. The increasing poor attendance of youths is because of the generational gap between the young and the old. Most of the youth of today don’t want to hear about the bible and salvation only. They find church programmes and activities too rigid. Unless we develop systems and programmes to keep them busy and entertained they will always find ways of entertaining themselves away from the church. We need to be youth-friendly and understand how the world has shifted in order to help them and change them from within and not from without.
Marital strife is becoming more pronounced. How do families facing such challenges navigate the new year?
Marriage is a mystery, it cannot or never be understood fully. What families need to do is to create more time and space for themselves to bond, dream, visualise and ventilate their deep-seated issues. Families need also to turn more to God than themselves and make God the pillar and centre of their families.
Most public schools in Kenya are church-sponsored. What should religious leaders do better to help curtail current indiscipline?
Our responsibility as religious leaders is to be more present in our schools and most importantly, understand that we cannot run schools like we run our churches. Churches and schools are different institutions that complement each other despite being distinct. We need to avoid making our students to live like saints in our schools. We need to help them learn and grow as students. Our problem is that we, as religious leaders, need to understand that most students struggle with issues that need our active listening than active preaching. A lot of counselling is seriously needed because students go through a lot beginning from family backgrounds and their upbringing. We need to be close to our students like we are close to our families so that we can learn about their deep-seated issues. We should deflate their burning issues before they explode. We also need to allow students to express themselves than only pressing them.
If Jesus Christ were to come back today, what, in your opinion, would disappoint him the most about Kenyans?
We have turned Kenya into Sodom and Gomorrah. We are busy building the tower of Babel. Everybody is busy doing his own things than the things of God. He never created us to destroy his creation but to safeguard it. Corruption has made its way even into churches. No one minds about the sanctity of life anymore. He would marvel at how Kenyans are increasingly becoming small gods especially those who are in power. They are the beginning and the end of the lives of Kenyans. There is only one God who is alpha and omega. That replacement would even disappoint him more than the life isolation we are leaving in. He never created us as isolated beings but as a family a blessed nation.