Harare sociologist Darington Nyabiko said the existence of home churches in Zimbabwe was due to a number of reasons, one being the love of money as “gosprenuership” had proved to be a lucrative bussiness.
“These are for the most part people who want to strip faith down to its bare minimum. They don’t want to have to support a big building and staff and insurance policies and advertising campaigns and fixing the roof, because all of that seems to them to be extraneous to what they understand a life of faith to be.”
“Some are rebelling against the contemporary culture of the megachurch, in which even midsized churches have adopted marketing campaigns, multimedia Bible studies and Sunday services and others, which seems to be difficult to many who believe worshiping is not a complicated thing. Others say they have been alienated by pastors who cling to power, or by churches that experiment with doctrine and styles of worship.”
“But as it stands, this country for the past decade has seen certain elements in society becoming filthy rich after forming a church.Who doesn’t like money?”
House churches are not solely a Zimbabwean phenomenon.
Missionaries and church leaders say there are thousands of them in countries where Christians are sometimes forced to meet clandestinely. House churches are also popular in countries where numbers of Evangelical Christians are growing.
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