Giving: The psychological perspective

01 Nov, 2015 - 00:11 0 Views
Giving: The psychological perspective Sunday Mail

The Sunday Mail

Desire Ncube

HARARE-based psychologist Mr Gwatirera Javangwe says the act of giving one’s resources to leaders is not unique to the church but a widely-held practice in various aspect of human endeavour.
Mr Javangwe, the head of the Psychology Department at the University of Zimbabwe, explains: “There are a few psychological concepts that will help us understand the behaviour of those who seed. First we need to understand what their motives are; some people are extrinsically motivated while others are intrinsically motivated.
“It is usually those that are extrinsically motivated who would cry foul when their expectations are not met. Expectations illustrate that the individual seeding signs a psychological contract and when nothing materialises they then begin to questions phenomena.
“The psychological contract refers to the unwritten set of expectations of the employment relationship as distinct from the formal, codified employment contract.
“Taken together, the psychological contract and the employment contract define the employer-employee relationship. Borrowing from this we also note that that set of expectations almost always fail to be fulfilled on the part of the church leader who may promise the followers that something positive is going to happen if they seed.
“Psychological contracts are a set of ‘promises’ or ‘expectations’ that are exchanged between the parties in a relationship.
“When those expectations are not met it shows that there is a psychological contract violation. The perceived psychological contract violation is a construct that regards ceding individual’s feelings of disappointment (ranging from minor frustration to betrayal) arising from their belief that their church leader or diviner has broken its religious intervention-related promises.”
He goes on: “Stemming from this issue, equity or fairness comes to the fore; this is because initially seeding may have been construed as a life enhancing activity, failure of which breeds social injustice.
“Questions of procedural and distributive justice become pertinent. However, we also need to realise that questioning the fulfilment of the promise also questions the sacredness of the church leader and his or her practice and ultimately his authority and authenticity.
“A close comparison is where people hardly question n’angas for failed promised. Hardly do people also question medical doctors when certain procedures fail to provide the expected results or when someone dies immediately after an operation.”
He says in the case of religious leaders, there is no consent and legality of the practice comes under scrutiny.
“One also notes that some of the spiritual leaders create the illusion that things are going to happen, without illustrating that it may or may not happen as promised.
“This feeds into mind control games and holographic games. The central tenet in all this discussion is the issue of ethics. It would appear we do not seem to have an ethical mechanism for holding these leaders accountable.”
Mr Javangwe is of the view that church umbrella bodies should ensure ethical standards are upheld by members, seeing as “for a long time this arena has been left unattended”.
Furthermore, he sees a need for rehabilitation of victims of dishonest seeding.
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