Faith healing in Uganda
By Dr. Ngobi Robert

Introduction

In Uganda Health services are provided by:

i) Public and private medical practitioners
ii) Witch doctors/traditional healers/witch craft
iii) Herbalists
iv) Faith healers

Public and Private medical services

Healing in the medical field means a gradual recovery process from an ailment following medical intervention. Before any therapy is administered, the following is done:

- History taking plus physical examination of the patient,
- Tentative/presumptive diagnosis may be made,
- Samples may be taken or the patient may be subjected to further investigation in x-ray, scanning etc. Laboratory investigations may be done,
- Finally a Definitive/confirmatory diagnosis is made from the findings of all the investigations above,
- Treatment (therapy) is prescribed,
- Prognosis is given,
- Reviews are done.

Such is the elaborate process of making a diagnosis before treatment is given. It is not blind therapy and there are no prayers involved. Such services can only be provided by professional health service providers (nurses, laboratory technicians, clinical officers, doctors etc) each playing a supportive role. The health service providers are professionally trained and share experience and knowledge accumulated over many years of research. That information is recorded and can be accessed in books, journals etc.

The doctors in particular take a Hippocratic oath and are registered with a professional body. They are registered and licensed to practice. In case of breach of professional ethics (Ethics means doing what one should do and not what one can do), they can be de-registered and denied a license to practice.

The services mentioned earlier are provided in fixed and licensed premises such as Hospitals, dispensaries, clinics etc., which may be private or public. And that should be the acceptable standard in all civilised nations.

Witch doctors and traditional healers

These have existed since time immemorial. They serve no purpose other than help reduce stress and anxiety among the sick and attendant relatives. Their survival entirely depends on the fear of sickness and death by their victims. All their actions are fraud because in Uganda they are characterised by:

i) They claim to evoke spirits which do the diagnosis and prescription.
ii) They operate in shrines stacked with dead animal parts all intended to instill fear in the patient.
iii) They demand sacrifices of animals to appease the ancestral spirits (their gods).
iv) They are illiterate but intelligent since they have managed to survive this long and d well-educated people as their clients.
v) Many offer human sacrifices in addition to demanding sex from female clients.
vi) They are driven by greed and extortionism since they know their trade is fraudulent.
vii) They threaten their clients with death in case of non-compliance. So you go to them at your own peril.
viii) Their knowledge is not researched, it is not shared and it is not documented. It is passed on from father to son whom they train in their game of trickery It is fraud, pure and simple.

Herbalists

These mostly administer herbal medicines. Their fraud is based on symptomatic treatment. More often than not they help to alleviate pain. Their medicine is in most cases broad spectrum - treating not less than one hundred diseases (symptoms).

Characteristics:

a) Most of them are illiterate and therefore engage in blind therapeutic medicine.
b) Their medicine may contain unrefined forms of modern medicine and therefore provide relief to the patient.
c) They are selfish since they don't share information among themselves, putting doubt to the credibility of their medicine.
d) Knowledge of this medicine and practice is also passed on from father to son. It is therefore not possible to correct mistakes and inaccuracy.
e) All their medicine is administered by oral, ectopic or inhalation routes. The question is - is all medicine given by only those three routes?

The faith-healing Pentecostal movement

New believers do indeed generally come to church with their own interests in mind - their salvation, their health, their well-being, and many Christians have bought into the western cultural emphasis on personal health and prosperity as ultimate ends in themselves.

Enter the Pentecostal movement.

Faith Healing in Uganda

Developed in ancient (primitive) or prehistoric times and used by primitive cultures, faith healing was a means to cope with sickness and death. But the idea was that the "miracle" was a focus for relieving anxiety - that of the patient and those close to him or her. And that is it - purely psychological treatment.

What about now?

Those who claim to be spiritually superior (pastors, apostles, prophets) have lured many unsuspecting Ugandans to their graves through claims of curing complicated diseases and other afflictions such as: cancer, AIDS, blindness, lameness, Demons etc.

There are diseases that healers, even the most charismatic, cannot cure. When they attempt to do so and they all fall into this trap, since they know and care nothing of the difference between functional and organic diseases, they tread on very dangerous ground. When healers (Pastors, Apostles....) treat (or pray over) serious organic diseases, they are responsible for the suffering of patients and even deaths. This happens because they keep patients away from possibly effective and life-saving help from modern medical practice.

The Law and Advertising

In Uganda, there is no law to protect thousands of unsuspecting people. Uganda is claimed to be a secular state and the principle of freedom of worship (Religion) is enshrined in our law books. Therefore the law is impotent about this fraud. The churches are registered as NGOs and are free to organise crusades both in churches and open public places. Hundreds of thousands of Ugandans are attracted to these crusades organised by local and international (globe-trotting) pastors. This often follows advertisements such as:

o The lame will walk
o The blind will see
o Cancer will be cured
o The unmarried are promised marriage
o The jobless are promised work
o Even AIDS will be cured

As you can see, the list is long and tempting. And the advertising in vigorous. It is done in mass media -Radio, TV, print media and on huge pastors often plastered in strategic locations. The healers claim to get their powers from God. That way, no one will question them. Their alleged association with the Lord also adds a certain respectability to their profession and protects them from harm in case something goes wrong. If the patient does not improve the patient is considered at fault for lacking sufficient faith. The burden of failure rests on the patients not the healer.

Do pastors and apostles kill?

Yes they do.

Symptoms such as pain, nausea, backache may be purely psychological and therefore functional in nature. In such cases the placebo effect (well know and practiced often in medical practice) does work. For the faith healer (pastor) an intensive prayer or mere touch will give the placebo effect. Most cases that respond to faith healing are psychosomatic illnesses or disorders that are caused by or aggregated by prolonged stress. Sinusitis, arthritis, headache, backache, angina, constipation, impotence and even infertility can be symptoms of psychosomatic disorders. As soon as the stress is gone they tend to disappear. In other words they are self-limiting - and hence the faith healer's success. These are the testimonies that are always touted by these pastors. But don't forget that some of them are concocted by the fraud stars to ply unsuspecting believers. Remember there is money in faith healing. These pastors accept donations, and it is not small money. You should see the opulent lifestyle of many of these pastors. People believe them and are willing to pay anything to witness a miracle. Because of the money boom in this trade, we are witnesses to the sprouting of monster churches such the Miracle Healing Centre, Christ Never Fails, Divine Harvesters etc.

Lucky are those who have seen but not been attracted to them.

But remember not all diseases are emotional problems and a doctor's medical background is often necessary to rule this out. When a patient goes to a faith healer without knowing what the problem is, that person runs the risk of delaying effective medical treatment that could save his or her life. In this case, the healer no longer helps the patients but becomes a killer. And remember - the law of free worship protects the killer.
Why do people go to faith healers (pastors/apostles)?

Faith healing is a fraud, so why do patients flock to miracle healing centres?

a) Unavailability of medicine
This may not be entirely true because this practice is most prevalent in urban centres where medicine is available and most people can access it.
b) Incurable diseases.
I am tempted to believe this is a strong reason because a person suffering from a terminal illness such as AIDS or advanced malignant cancer is a desperate person. But to deceive such a person with miracle cures is evil.
c) Lack of health facilities
This may be true for remote places but again in such places the practice in either herbalists or witchcraft.
d) The expensive fees of medical services.
This may be true, but a lot of well to do people flock these churches seeking faith healing services.
e) Unquestioning faith
Remember that religion is like alcohol and at its worst like opium. It can be addictive if taken in large doses. The Kanungu infarno in which hundreds of people were burnt because of unquestioning faith is still fresh in our minds. [But see the paper on this massacre, Ed.]
f) Propaganda Testimonies
Those who provide testimonies could be recoverers from psychosomatic disorders (self limiting diseases) or people bought by the pastors to hoodwink the unsuspecting public. Organised medicine's silent treatment of the faith healers has worsened the situation. Quite often there are no previous medical records to help investigate the truthfulness of these claims. And this is where I call upon we Humanists to work with the medical practitioners to expose this fraud. Feelings of well-being are influenced by a great many factors. People naturally feel better when others gather around them and make them the focus of their attention. Honesty requires that claims of miraculous healing be delayed until careful examinations are made over longer periods of time, and others must be permitted to investigate those claims.
g) Compassion
Some doctors don't care about their patients. Some healers offer patients more warmth and compassion than physicians do. It is not a question of passing out pills and performing operations, but do they rarely care? That is indifference. Compassionate healers can sometimes do more for patients than cold, uncaring physicians - not because they have any supernatural powers but because most ailments are psychological in nature and will often disappear given the warmth and reassurance the healers offer.