South Africa: CRL Rights Commission finds systemic commercialisation and abuse of belief in the unregulated prophetic-church sector

Proceedings

1. 2017-08-01 · official investigative hearings and report

   CRL Rights Commission, South Africa (Chapter 9 constitutional body). Following 2016 media reports of prophets in Neo-Pentecostal and independent prophetic churches instructing congregants to eat grass, snakes and insecticide-sprayed food and to drink petrol and detergent, and of leaders demanding large sums for prayer, blessings, and 'miracle' water or oil, the CRL Rights Commission held public hearings and published a report finding evidence of widespread commercialisation of religion and abuse of people's belief systems, and recommending licensing and peer-review regulation of religious practitioners and places of worship. The regulatory recommendations were publicly rejected by the responsible ministry (COGTA) in 2018 after sustained objection from religious-freedom advocates; the finding of documented abuse itself was not reversed.

Documented coercion mechanisms

• claimed prophetic and healing authority used to extract money from congregants and to compel dangerous or degrading acts (ingesting snakes, grass, insecticide, petrol; being driven over by a car) framed as tests or proofs of faith
• structural absence of any peer-review or accountability mechanism for self-declared religious leaders