The divorce mess between Pastors Chris and Anita
Oyakhilome of Christ Embassy Church has worsened,
On Sunday, two days after it was reported that Anita
Oyakhilome had filed for divorce, Christ Embassy
deleted her pictures and personal information from
its official website, www.christembassy.org.
Many describe the action as the beginning of a
process to shut her out of the church, after she
accused her husband of “adultery” and “unreasonable
behaviours” in a divorce suit filed in London last
April but only made public on Friday..
Christ Embassy’s new website now shows only
Pastor Chris Oyakhilome, with a broad smile
welcoming his followers to the month of August,
and tagging it, ‘Month of Praise’.
In the message on the website, Oyakhilome also
urges his followers to “rejoice for the joy of the
Lord is your strength.”
Also, on the website of the Rhapsody of Realities, a
daily devotional co-authored by the esrtwhile
couple, there’s nothing to show that Anita is still
recognised as the only visible face on the website
among the family members is that of her husband.
It was too early to know if the September edition of
the Rhapsody of Realities still has the photographs
of both the pastor and his wife as it used to be.
In the past, when the going was good, Anita and
Chris Oyakhilome held hands on the church website
and smiled broadly. They projected the image of a
perfect couple.at the weekend revealed that
there is confusion in the church following the
divorce suit filed by Anita to end her over two
decades marriage to the founder of Christ Embassy
Church.
In the past, Pastor Chris headed the Nigerian
branch of the church, though he travelled to other
branches occasionally, while Anita headed the
branch in London and its environs.
Christ Embassy and its founder have been
embroiled in a myriad of controversies in the past.
In 2010, Oyakhilome was accused of engineering a
money laundering scheme in Nigeria, and questions
swirled around his finances because of his
glamorous lifestyle.
Many pastors and theologians also excoriated
Oyakhilome for his “New Creation” doctrine—a
form of gnosticism that says after a person becomes
a Christian, any sin they commit is only in the body
and will not affect the spirit.
In 2008, Oyakhilome’s reputation as a faith healer
was tarnished badly in Johannesburg, South Africa,
when a man told a Soweto newspaper that Christ
Embassy offered him more than $1,200 to sit in a
wheelchair and pretend to be crippled until
Oyakhilome prayed for him.
“The man went to the media instead of taking the
money, sparking concerns that healings were being
faked to impress growing crowds,” said Lee Grady
in an article in 2012 published by Charisma
Magazine.
Pastor Chris Oyakhilome has also been a target of
criticism by the Treatment Action Campaign for his
support of faith healing to cure HIV.
Allegations that Christ Embassy members are
reportedly being forced to give huge sums of money
in offerings with the biggest donors receiving the
biggest awards have left many people concerned.
Many Nigerians have also alleged that the church
operates like a cult and pressures members to
marry only within Christ Embassy.
Many people also remember the scandal involving
Christ Embassy and Sheraton Hotel some years ago
when a member of the church, who worked at the
Sheraton Hotel, stole money from his employers
and gave it to Christ Embassy. But when Sheraton
approached the church for reimbursement, the
church allegedly claimed that the money had been
given to God and could not be refunded.
Many also excoriated Pastor Chris some years ago
when the church began collecting gate fees from
members for their New Year Eve’s Service.
More recently, Oyakhilome came under attack after
he claimed that Christians were free to masturbate
because it was not a sin.
But the latest scandal involving Anita and Chris,
who have two daughters, seems to threaten the very
existence of one of the biggest churches in Nigeria.
Christ Embassy runs several arms including the
Healing School, Rhapsody of Realities, and an N.G.O
called the Innercity Missions as well as three
Christian television channels: LoveWorld TV,
LoveWorld SAT and LoveWorld Plus.
The church is scattered all over the world,
including in the United Kingdom, the United States,
South America and the whole of Europe.
Stories about women bringing men of God down are
not new. In 1988, Jimmy Swaggart, a famous
American preacher was implicated in a s*x scandal
involving a prostitute that resulted initially in his
suspension, and ultimately defrocking, by the
Assemblies of God.
Three years later, Swaggart was implicated in
another scandal involving a prostitute. As a result,
Swaggart’s ministry became non-affiliated, non-
denominational and significantly smaller than it
was before the scandals.
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