The vice-president of the PCRN produces an argument to reject accusations made against revival churches in general by those who support drinking establishments. Anne Féconde Noah makes multiple statements in a context of increasing closure of non-compliant revival churches accused of being sources of noise pollution. Here is the full text of her publication made on July 13, 2026.
- “LIE NUMBER 1: REVIVAL CHURCHES WOULD ENCOURAGE DIVORCES
One of the religious communities that most protects marriage is the Pentecostal community. It is within this community that the teaching on submission is so heavy that women endure and bear so much suffering because divorce is not an option. Some assemblies simply forbid it and those who divorce are excommunicated. Your statement is therefore false. I speak AS QUALIFIED, it is my environment.
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What generally happens is that once a person is converted, the spouse sometimes decides to reject them out of fear of judgment.
It is the Christians of the revival churches who are often stigmatized and excluded from families when they decide to keep their faith and preserve their Salvation. The opposite is marginal.
Moreover, believers of all other religions sometimes divorce for one reason or another. It is not a particularity. In terms of percentage, it is not in revival churches that the most divorces occur.
2- LIE NUMBER 2: CHURCHES RUIN FAMILIES AND PILLAGE ECONOMIES WHILE BARS WOULD NOT
There is this prevailing lie that revival churches would ruin the faithful.
To begin with, it is not the religious community that collects the most offerings in Cameroon, not at all! Revival churches do things transparently, and what they do is visible. But if you have a problem with offerings, look elsewhere.
What is church money used for? I will come back to bars, although the comparison starts from accusations of noise pollution (outside such a context, there is nothing comparable).
To answer this question, I give you a practical case.
In my assembly, the biggest contributors in terms of tithes and offerings are THE CHILDREN OF THE PASTOR MY FATHER. What are our contributions and those of the few members who participate used for?
a- To pay for the education of children from poor families.
b- To support members in difficulty (housing problems, employment, and related issues)
c- To pay for care and provide necessities to the sick in hospitals. We are very present at Jamot hospital.
d- To finance members’ medical care for ailments that require hospital treatment
e- To intervene for anyone when the need arises and our fund is sufficient. Even though the Bible allows pastors to live from part of the offerings, and this is the case in ALL RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIES INCLUDING MARABOUTS, many pastors, like the apostle Paul, choose to renounce what is due to them. Yes, it is due to them; you do not know how complicated it is to be a pastor and invoke God for others. I will come back to this.
Returning to this example, we will continue to give money to the church to help our fellow humans. Give to marabouts, give in your religious congregations, we will give for those who can do so. The tithe is 10% of income; for those who have income, it is barely what is spent on drinks and other not necessarily convenient things in the same period.
The widespread story that churches ruin families, based on marginal examples, is false. Offerings and tithes are for those who can do so and for noble causes. Finally, I want to remind that many pastors have prosperous economic activities unrelated to the church. It is an outdated cliché to think that pastors are poor people waiting for offerings to live, even though they are entitled to a salary as workers of Christ.
On the other hand, bars ruin families.
I know and you certainly know at least one father who spends his salary at the bar before arriving home and claims his wallet was stolen.
They have credit books at bars. When the salary comes in, it must be repaid first. Sometimes children have no school supplies, but parents are indebted at the bar. Sometimes they even have to borrow from loan sharks to pay drink debts.
They hand over the pay slip, checkbook, or other to the loan shark to cover the drink debt, hoping to repay with the next salary, but the bar activity is so addictive that they never repay. This is how fathers end their lives enslaved by drink debts. Yet, they would have attended a revival church that teaches the gospel of Christ, that thanks to teaching and prayer, they would have managed to get out of such a vicious circle.
When you try to justify the noise pollution of bars to support the closure of places of worship, let’s agree on one thing: your problem is not noise pollution. It is an ideological stance: You hate the revival church. We do not ask for your love anyway; we ask you to respect our right to practice the worship of our choice. Moreover, we do not ask this as if your permission were awaited. It is life in the Republic that requires it.
The bars of Essos, I was saying, are the hot spots of Sodom and Gomorrah. The promiscuity of these places in general opens the way to so many deviant behaviors that it would rarely occur to a person of good faith to encourage a spouse, child, or relative to spend time there often.
Ah! The noises! You say bars do not “lay” the consumers?
What happens in these places or even just after these places, when alcohol has taken effect, would be incorrect to describe. If members of a church fall into sin, it is an exception, it is condemned, and they are suspended when known. It means the flesh took over for a moment; Christians are humans who are aware of their human condition and tend to improve with God’s grace. These are marginal situations.
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On the other hand, bars, especially those in Essos, are places dedicated to all kinds of immoral behaviors. Some people go there for that. Moreover, men/women who frequent these places very much dislike seeing their spouses there.
If you are concerned about morality, you have taken the worst example.
What are you actually trying to compare? The church that teaches to be good people who do not wish harm to others, and places of promiscuity with known consequences?
Nevertheless, since the Republic allows everyone to move around, and since decibels are clearly a problem for citizens for various reasons, regulation must have a general scope. It is as simple as that. Revival churches are not the “cheapest” in the Republic because generally, we are peaceful people.
- THIRD LIE ABOUT DEMONS THAT WOULD BE THE EXCLUSIVE DOMAIN OF REVIVAL CHURCHES
In all religions practiced by humans, DEMONS EXIST.
So-called ancestral religions are no exception. They are called by various names, but malevolent spirits, charged with harming humans, exist. They are fought in various ways, but they are cast out. It does not seem to bother those who hate revival churches when marabouts or their own religious guides cast out DEMONS. Exorcism sessions do not bother much if they are not performed by pastors.
So what is the problem? The demons or the profile of those who cast them out?
- FOURTH LIE: REVIVAL CHURCHES LIE ABOUT FAMILY MEMBERS
I would give the impression of attacking other religious communities if I cited recent cases of leaders who told women that their husbands are members of pernicious sects whenever they were promoted.
Those who take spouses hostage push them to go into debt to buy talismans, which are numerous outside revival churches.
Those who become “co-spouses” in the homes of the faithful are recruited everywhere, and not mainly in revival churches.
Bad apples: you find them everywhere!
But let’s focus on marabouts.
When you consult marabouts and they indicate that the cause of a problem x or Y is family-related, that you must give village chickens and black goats to solve these problems, it does not shock much.
When it is a traditionalist who targets a family link to explain a problematic situation, it is normal.
Only, if a pastor has prayed, has listened to God answer the same thing to a person who consulted him, he divides a family.
Since pastors are there to lie about people’s families, it is simply necessary to conclude that witchcraft does not exist, its agents do not exist, malevolent spirits do not exist, and that all exorcism activities in all religions, among marabouts, and traditionalists should be ended. Isn’t it? That would be more coherent.
- FIFTH LIE: REVIVAL CHURCHES DIVIDE HOUSEHOLDS
I developed a part of this issue above; I will answer it with an example.
How do churches divide households according to those who hate them?
Practical case:
A woman arrives at the pastor’s house at night with her daughters. They are fleeing. The reason for this flight is that she caught the spouse trying to abuse the children to fulfill unknown conditions. She fled with her children.
When the spouse, afraid the secret will be revealed, arrives with the police supposedly to recover his family, and the pastor asks him to wait until morning, that the woman and children take refuge with family and resolve the problem in such a setting, BECAUSE YOU DO NOT THROW OUT PEOPLE WHO ASK FOR HELP, he has divided a household.
6-SIXTH LIE: THE REVIVAL CHURCH KILLS
It is far too easy to base oneself on a tragedy for which an investigation is ongoing to justify the persecution launched against revival churches.
Has the investigation shown that a pastor asked a child with a psychiatric profile worthy of interest to commit such a crime?
If that were the case, is criminal responsibility not individual in Cameroon?
Do not look for excuses to mask your feelings.
Beyond a few isolated cases, which are amplified to tarnish the revival church in Cameroon, here is how it works.
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