Pastor’s DAUGHTER Got Pregnant

Worshipers Demanded He Resigns!

If there is a hot subject in the village it is when the daughter of a local church minister gets the baby bug. Whispers of gossip will be heard from a distance the moment passers by or bystanders spot the girl of the moment, the one soul her pastor dad ‘did not preach to.’ Like a newly released movie, she is ‘Now Showing’ material and quite a sensation, especially if the young man who fathered the child is a die-hard ‘bow wow wow’ kind of boy of the ‘wazup!’ hip hop age. Meaning he does not even realize he caused an ‘accident’ and is still driving on the lovebird superhighway looking this way and that as new ‘chicks’ speed by.

So will the pastor agree to bring up a child born out of wedlock? Oh yes, he should, some will reason, with so many verses to quote from the Holy Book about forgiveness, perseverance and turning the other cheek.

Slap in the face

When it happened to Jennifer (real name withheld), her dad who is a pastor slapped her on the face. In essence she had stung him and he was simply returning her fire. Being a religious man, society demanded that his children toe the line.

However, this is not always the case. In some cases a disconnect can emerge, children and parents go different ways and sometimes they do not even attend the same worship house. One possible cause is when too much focus on religious activity clouds child development leaving teens and adolescents confused about sexuality. This is not peculiar to religious parents but is also a common trait among busy career parents or parents who are too happy-go-lucky and spend virtually all their free time socializing and drinking.

Religious or not, parents must not cringe when they find their children reading ‘adult’ material or discussing sex. They need to tactfully engage their children on these matters that make the hairs of conservative mums and dads stand.

Needed to have an abortion

News of Jennifer’s pregnancy exploded and spread like a furious fire. It was as if she had taken someone’s life yet she had just created one. ‘I felt like the world had disowned me,’ she says. Those are the days I knew who my true friends were.’

‘Just before I sat my fourth form exams, the headmistress summoned my father to school. The entire school knew my dad as ‘Pastor.’ I did not understand why the headmistress had to call dad — are such issues as pregnancy not best discussed with a mother? After the striking news, dad lost it and in an unguarded moment handed me a straight slap on my face. He was mad, totally out of control. When he started to lecture me however, I realized it was all about himself, his reputation, his family, his status. It dawned on me that it was not about me or my future. He ordered me to stay away from ‘his’ house after my last paper in school. I was a disgrace to his family and he did not want my siblings to be associated with me.

That is when I knew he did not care about me. I needed to have an abortion really badly.

I was busted!

My mother was prophetic about my intentions and one day told me firmly, ‘…as you deal with this problem, don’t you dare think of an abortion.’ I was busted! Today I am glad I did not abort my lovely baby, thanks to her support and advice.

My father on the other hand did not care what I did with my life. At one point he told me to leave his family and go get married. I remember him threatening not to pay school fees for my sister, who at the time was in form one, saying that she might follow in my footsteps. He made me feel suicidal.

Life is what you make of it

‘Mama Kanisa’, as mum is known in our estate in Nairobi’s Eastlands, restored my sanity when she assured me that all would be well. She encouraged me and told me that being pregnant was not the end of the world. ‘Life is what you make of it. You cannot just ruin your life because of a single mistake,’ she said. I believed her.

When the church members found out I was pregnant the unexpected happened; they isolated my father and accused mother of neglecting her children. Some church elders even had the audacity to ask my father to resign as pastor. He was blamed for not teaching his children what he preached.

Mum talked dad into taking a softer stand. One day he said he had forgiven me but would never forget the embarrassment I had caused him. For a very long time I had not seen him happy, but on the day I delivered he smiled at me and was even concerned about my health. When I was discharged from hospital he picked me up with his car and took us home.

END: PG 2/39