Having a Hand Waved in Your Face

But not just anybody's hand. It can't be the hand of Aunt Greta, Uncle Thomas, nor Marie Laveau. It's gotta be the hand of a faith healer in Nigeria. (Why do so many of these fake cures come from Africa and India??)

Anyway, Yahoo! member "odunforkay"--who says he's a pediatric podiatrist--says that Pastor T.B. Joshua can--and has--healed people of HIV and AIDS. I don't believe it for a second. (Obviously...)

This so-called "pastor" doesn't heal you in the ways you might have seen--with the hand >SMACKING!< you on the forehead. Oh, no. "Pastor" Joshua simply has to wave his hand in front of your face and--"Praise be to Jeee-sus-ah!"--you will be healed. He even has a picture on his pathetically uplifting web site of a person he's "healed" holding up two pieces of paper. The caption says that one says "positive" and the other says "negative" but it's really too hard to see for sure. I mean, they could be report cards, for all we can tell. Of course, English is the language of Nigeria and naturally, the person holding the papers, of course, is the one about whom the forged and fake documents are about.

Anyway, this "cure" takes up to four weeks. And, to his credit (I guess), "Pastry" Joshua (not a typo) will actually put you up for the four weeks his little hand-waving takes. And, lo and behold, "Praise be to Gah-dah!", HIV is "gone forever by God [sic] grace". According to odunforkay, anyway (who, naturally, doesn't have any independantly verified proof).

I asked this Odun character if he was a doctor. He replied, "yes iam [sic] a medical practioner [sic] under the under the Synagogoue [sic] church of God. i.e [sic] pastor T.B Joshua." I asked if he had a medical degree from an accredited university. He replied that he did and it was from Lagos University Teaching Hospital.

I went on to ask, "What is your medical specialty? Podiatry? Pediatrics?"

His reply? "Yes." Wherefrom I assumed he was a pediatric podiatrist. It's the only logical explanation, isn't it?

I asked, "What does a pediatric podiatrist know about HIV replication and treatment?"

And all he could reply with was, "u [sic] don't understand" and that he studied "this" (whatever "this" is) from his dad who was an herbalist.

Look. Religion is fine. Believing in Jesus is fine. But when someone starts saying they can cure HIV and AIDS by waving a hand in front of a person's face all they do is make the "healed" person go out and not take care of him- or herself. And that's bad. That person could easily stop taking their meds and die. Yeah, I know that the HIV and AIDS epidemic in Africa is really, really bad. But Pastor T.B. Joshua and his little lying minions are making it worse.

(Phew! And two minutes to spare for the day!!)