According to Singer and Small (2008), conflicts is defined as violent disputes pitting two individuals or groups or nations. Heidelberg Institute for International Conflict Research (HIIK, 2005) defined conflicts as an opposing of interests. Thus, this is positional variances regarding some values and involving more than one party including groups, organized groups, states, and organizations with the aim of pursuing their benefits to succeed in their cases. Despite the establishment and growth of Pentecostal churches all over Nigeria, they are punctured by conflict. Kamau (1994) asserts that there are many cases of conflicts in Pentecostal churches, usually followed by splits which negatively affect church growth. The conflicts usually subdue the efforts put forth to resolve them. According to Gathuki (2015), there were several Pentecostal churches that had been established in Kiria-ini town before CCI was established. Some of these churches were the Gospel Outreach, Revival and Hope, Deliverance Church, United Pentecostal Church and Glorious Worship Centre among others. These churches grew and had influence in Kiria-ini town. They attracted many followers from this town and its neighborhood. However, all these churches were later embroiled with conflicts which led to their closure as they lost their members to unending

conflicts.

Similar conflicts and subsequent splits in Pentecostal churches are also common in Kenya (Kagema & Maina 2014). In 2008, the Full Gospel Churches of Kenya (FGCK) was involved in a succession of dispute that broke the sixty-year-old unity which it had enjoyed. This dispute effectively split the church into two factions namely the original FGCK and a faction called Worldwide Full Gospel Churches (Gathuki, 2015). Earlier in the year 2000, similar conflicts had split the Gospel Outreach Church of Kenya forming a new faction called Gospel Revival Centre (GRC). In 2014, the Deliverance Church Nyeri branch, which had about 300 members, got involved in leadership conflicts which split it into two. A large group of members led by the deputy pastor left this church and established a church called Prime Ministry International (PMI) (Gathuki, 2015).

Leadership wrangles is a leading cause of conflict in churches today (Awojobi, 2011). Leadership conflict is the vigorous struggle or may include disorderly fight with the aim of occupying a leadership position or post by whatever means possible which is contrary to the accepted norm or laid down rules/procedure or standard. Put differently, it is a desire to ascend to leadership by “fire or force” or “do or die” against the will of majority. Some people in the church have used diabolical means to take over a given office.

Various examples can be given for churches that have undergone church conflict. For instance, the Church of God Mission under Archbishop Benson Idahosa experienced leadership conflict immediately after his demise

(Awojobi, 2011). This was after the ordination of his wife, Margaret Idahosa, as his successor even after numerous protests. In protest, some pastors and bishops under this ministry started their own because they were not satisfied with the choice of the wife as their leader (ibid). In another instance, in 2010, a case was filed in the Federal High Court, Lagos as two pastors Olusheye and Akintola were fighting to succeed Pastor E. H. Olusheye as the head of Christ Apostolic Church worldwide (Awojobi, 2011).

According to Haugk (2008), Sande (2004) and Donovan (2006), church conflicts are the major cause of member mobility as people move back and forth from one church to the other never to settle as they seek spiritual satisfaction and a place to belong. Thus, the congregation gets into a state of mobility and change. This mobility exposes Pentecostal Christians to abuse by church leaders who in most cases exploit them financially because they are desperate and are looking for identity. These scholars further observe that many of these members may not know the source of the problem and often hope that such conflicts will be resolved. However, when the situation gets worse to the extent of splitting or closing down a church, such Christians become emotionally unstable and may not trust any other church leader again.

Ansre (1997) noted that personal animosities have also been found to cause family division and loss of property. For instance, the division of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church resulted in the closure of the church buildings and disruption of the church services. Awedoba (2009) writes that in the absence of peace and unity, the development is retarded. Conflicts in most cases lead to the destruction of personal property or even church properties, personal harm, and the sense of uncertainty remains tall. In such an environment of conflict, development of the church is unlikely until peace returned. During the time of conflict, church members take sides and confrontation with opposing sides, and it sometimes turns physical.

Negligence of children Sunday school in today’s church

The Sunday School has come under fire. “The Sunday School is dead as a church growth tool in America today.” The author has heard comments similar to this one made at a number of conferences and meetings with pastors and church leaders in recent years. Many pastors and denominational leaders today are convinced that the Sunday School is no longer an effective method or program for reaching the lost for Jesus Christ and church membership. Many have drawn what the author believes to be an inaccurate and inappropriate conclusion, that the Sunday School is antiquated and irrelevant. Some feel it is no longer a viable means of ministry or worthy of church priority. Others claim that Sunday School was a giant in its heyday but it has become a non-effective program for the twenty-first century

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The Contribution of  The Church Towards The Economic Development Of Nigeria

There has been a debate on the contribution (or lack of it) of European Christian Missionaries to the development and self-understanding of Africans since the publication of the book, The mission on Trial (1977). Some acute observers of the history of ideas have recently reopened the same debate on a local level with particular reference to the Church in Nigeria. A quarter years after the first centenary of the coming of the first missionary heralds of the Gospel in Eastern Nigerian in 1885 is a landmark. In the history of the universal Church, it is a brief period. In the history of evangelization in the Eastern part of Nigeria, it is a vital period. The faltering steps of early days have gradually given way to a robust and fast-growing community of faith, with elements of joys and sorrows, problems and plans, the successes and failures. It helps us to understand better the growth of social, intellectual, political and material development brought to the people of the area by this Church.

The social, cultural and political problems hampering Nigeria’s quest for unity and appropriate human development have become major staples of contemporary concern of the Church in Nigeria (Obinna, 1995).

The multi-dimensional aspects of development in the various facets of the Nigerian Society have received the attention of the Church and still beckon on the Church for dialogue, critical and constructive dynamism if the church must continue to be relevant today and into the future. Indeed the history of the Church in Nigeria does not make full appreciative sense without a decisive entry for the better into the economic, cultural and socio-political development of the nation (Onwuanibe, 1995). Only with such vigorous engagement for the authentic progress and development of the nation can the Church’s message be welcome in the seeking of solutions to emergent development problems facing the country. Ultimately, human development is about the realization of potential. It is about what people can do and what they can become–their capabilities and about the freedom they have to exercise real choices in their lives.

The Holy Ghost Fathers had been in Eastern Nigerian for about eighty-five years. Not until after the Nigeria-Biafra war has their influence been somewhat minimized. Arriving originally from France in 1885, the Roman Catholic Missionaries exerted a considerable influence on the lives of the people of the region far out of proportion to their number. They became a factor to reckon with in the history of the development of the region.

The former Eastern Nigeria has been carved out into nine separate States of Abia, Anambra, Enugu, Ebonyi, Imo, Akwa-Ibom, Cross-River, Rivers and Bayelsa. The missionary efforts of the Holy Ghost Congregation covered the above-mentioned areas with their take-off point at Onitsha, Anambra State. There were only four missionaries who arrived at Onitsha in 1885. By 1918, there were a total of thirty-two Roman Catholic missionaries—Priests, Brothers and Sisters. The beginning of the Church in Nigeria was slow and arduous, but persistent as those great missionaries such as Fr. Leon Alexander Lejeune, Monsignor Pierre Le Berre, Fr. Joseph Lutz, Fr. Horne, Brothers Hermas and Jean-Gotto, Mr. Charles Townsend and Bishop Shanahan courageously made their way into the hinterland to bring the light of Christian faith in Nigeria especially in Eastern Nigeria in the early 1900s (Onwuanibe, 1995, 66). The missionary activities continued to spread to reach the remote part of Igboland, Efikland and other parts of Eastern Nigeria.

The impact of the Church can be felt in the dismantling of inhuman practices and institutions such as slavery, human sacrifice, killing of twins, and in the establishment of Christian villages which eventually gave way to schools for formal education. Translation of the Gospel into the vernacular languages and the production of catechisms in vernacular languages showed the good sense of recognizing the native culture, for language or tongue is a main  vehicle of culture and development. Many local customs were banned as “pagan” and there is need today for inculturation in terms of appraising and recognizing good traditional values (Onwuanibe, 1995).

By building schools which range from the primary to secondary levels the Church recognized the importance of education in development. The Church has also had a programme of medical, social and personality development. She lays great emphasis especially through the voices of recent ecclesiastical hierarchy on the determining role of a just and widespread development for all the corners of the globe. She sees this condition as a prerequisite for world

peace via international solidarity. She even gives development a new name: peace (Paul VI, 1967). The Church therefore stresses on the true condition of integral development, one that does not disfigure the human person by a neglect of any of the important constituents of his personality.