Stop Blaming the Pulpit Alone: The Congregation Also Has a Responsibility

There is an uncomfortable truth we need to confront: religious leaders do not operate in a vacuum.

Every preacher has an audience.

Every pulpit has a congregation.

Every controversial doctrine has people willing to defend it, repeat it, finance it, share it online and, sometimes, attack anyone who questions it.

So when people tell Fada Oluoma, “Advise your fellow pastors too,” they are not entirely wrong.

Clergy should absolutely be held accountable for what they say.

But there is another side of the conversation that we often avoid:

What responsibility does the congregation have?

I have criticised religious leaders when I believe their statements are misleading, irrational or inconsistent with observable reality. That responsibility does not disappear because the person making the statement wears a clerical collar or stands behind a pulpit.

But neither should the responsibility end with the preacher.

Consider the statement that Nigeria's destiny is to export revival.

People applauded.

Among those applauding were graduates of economics, accounting, engineering, computer science and other disciplines that supposedly train people to interrogate evidence, analyse systems and distinguish claims from facts.

Yet, inside the church, some suspend those habits of reasoning.

A person can spend years studying engineering and understand the importance of evidence, testing and physical laws—and then enter a religious gathering where an extraordinary claim is made and respond simply:

“Amen!”

That contradiction deserves examination.

Faith does not require intellectual surrender

There is nothing inherently wrong with religious faith.

Faith and reason have coexisted for centuries.

The problem begins when faith becomes an excuse for abandoning the capacity to question.

A believer can ask:

Is this actually what the Bible says?

Is this consistent with reality?

What evidence supports this claim?

Is the preacher expressing an opinion, or claiming to speak for God?

Could this statement cause people to make harmful decisions?

Those are not necessarily questions of unbelief.

They can be questions of intellectual responsibility.

A doctor does not stop being a Christian when she asks for medical evidence.

An engineer does not become less religious because he rejects a scientifically impossible claim.

An economist does not betray God by asking whether a proposed economic argument actually makes sense.

And a Christian does not become rebellious simply because he asks a preacher:

“How do you know?”

The congregation can create the market for nonsense

This is the part we rarely discuss.

Preachers respond to incentives too.

If dramatic claims attract crowds, generate applause, produce viral clips, increase donations and strengthen personal authority, there is an incentive to make more dramatic claims.

If congregations reward exaggeration and punish questioning, they create an environment where exaggeration flourishes.

The audience therefore becomes part of the ecosystem.

A preacher makes a questionable claim.

The congregation applauds.

The clip goes online.

Thousands share it.

Supporters attack critics.

The preacher becomes more influential.

And the cycle repeats.

Eventually, the outrageous becomes normal.

That is how institutional cultures develop.

The dangerous part is when theology overrides reality

Imagine a medical professional who understands that infectious diseases are caused by pathogens but applauds a preacher who claims that diseases are primarily produced or transmitted through demonic forces.

The problem is not that the person believes in God.

The problem is that a professional understanding of medicine has been suspended because the claim came from a religious authority.

That can have real consequences.

Someone may delay treatment.

Someone may reject vaccination.

Someone may stop taking prescribed medication.

Someone may spend money pursuing spiritual solutions to a medical problem that requires medical intervention.

Faith can provide comfort and meaning.

It should not become an excuse to reject established knowledge.

“God said it” is not an argument

This is perhaps the most important principle.

When someone says:

“God told me…”

the burden of verification becomes complicated.

Other people cannot independently inspect a private revelation.

That makes humility particularly important.

A preacher can say:

“This is my interpretation.”

That leaves room for discussion.

But saying:

“God told me this, therefore questioning me is questioning God”

creates an entirely different power relationship.

The preacher is no longer merely offering an interpretation.

He is claiming divine authority.

And once that happens, disagreement can be transformed into rebellion.

That is where accountability becomes essential.

Religious authority needs an informed audience

A healthy religious community should not be populated by people who simply repeat whatever their favourite preacher says.

It should produce people capable of thinking.

People should be able to admire a pastor and still disagree with him.

They should be able to respect a priest and still question a claim.

They should be able to love their church and still demand evidence when extraordinary claims are made.

The congregation should not become an echo chamber.

Because once the audience stops questioning, the preacher acquires extraordinary power.

This applies to everyone—including Fada Oluoma

There is also an important principle of consistency here.

If we demand accountability from Pastor Arome, we should demand it from every religious leader.

If we criticise Pentecostal preachers for misleading statements, we should also be prepared to criticise Catholic priests when they make misleading statements.

If we reject superstition from one denomination, we should reject it from another.

Accountability cannot depend on whether the speaker belongs to our preferred theological camp.

Otherwise, we are not defending truth.

We are defending our tribe.

And tribal loyalty is one of the biggest obstacles to intellectual honesty.

Religion is not necessarily the problem

Religion itself is too broad a target.

The more useful question is:

What happens when religious authority becomes immune from scrutiny?

That can happen in Christianity.

It can happen in Islam.

It can happen in traditional religions.

It can happen in political movements.

It can happen in secular ideologies.

Humans have a remarkable capacity to turn ideas into identities and identities into tribes.

Once that happens, evidence can become secondary to loyalty.

The solution is therefore not simply to attack religion.

It is to cultivate critical thinking, intellectual humility and accountability within religious communities.

Stop outsourcing your conscience

Perhaps the greatest responsibility belongs to the individual believer.

A preacher cannot think for you.

A priest cannot take responsibility for every decision you make.

A prophet cannot replace your conscience.

And a congregation cannot absolve you of the responsibility to distinguish truth from falsehood.

You can respect spiritual authority without surrendering intellectual responsibility.

You can believe in miracles without believing every miracle claim.

You can believe in divine intervention without assuming every unfortunate event is supernatural.

You can admire a preacher without treating him as infallible.

And you can be deeply religious while asking uncomfortable questions.

That is not an attack on faith.

It is a defence of human responsibility.

The congregation must become part of the solution

So yes, pastors should be challenged.

Priests should be challenged.

Prophets should be challenged.

Religious institutions should be challenged.

But ordinary believers must also challenge themselves.

When a preacher makes an extraordinary claim, don't immediately ask:

“Who is attacking our pastor?”

Ask:

“Is it true?”

When someone says Nigeria's destiny is to export revival, ask what that actually means.

When someone makes a medical claim, consult medical evidence.

When someone makes an economic claim, examine the economics.

When someone claims divine authority, ask what justifies that claim.

And when the evidence contradicts the claim, have the courage to say:

“I don't think this is true.”

Because ultimately, the power of a pulpit does not come only from the person standing behind it.

It comes from the people sitting in front of it.

And if millions of intelligent, educated and hardworking people continue rewarding every extraordinary claim with applause, money and unquestioning loyalty, then blaming the preacher alone misses half the problem.

A pulpit can only dominate a society to the extent that society permits it to.

The responsibility for challenging nonsense does not belong exclusively to pastors.

It belongs to all of us.

Especially those of us who know better.