A video clip has been circulating on social media in which Apostle Grace Lubega of Phaneroo Ministries International is telling congregants:
“By the way, I think last week we got another HIV person healed—hallelujah! They have checked and checked; he is clean. Tell your neighbour: ‘God is good.’ Halleluja! You may take your seats.”
On his X page, there is another video clip in which he says:
“The word of God cannot fail because this is the absoluteness of his power, an open invitation to a life in the world.
“Because you have received the faith of Christ and you have embraced the righteousness of God through faith, grace and peace are multiplied.
“That is why we lay hands on them and they walk. We lay hands on the blind and they see. We lay hands on the deaf and they hear.”
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These are extraordinary claims.
Apostle Lubega’s first claim suggests he can treat people suffering from HIV/AIDS.
HIV/AIDS still kills. In 2024, says the World Health Organisation, approximately 630,000 people died from HIV‑related causes.
Uganda was once ravaged by HIV/AIDS. But, thanks to medical advances, people with HIV now live much longer. Major Rubaramira Ruranga, for example, told Spark TV days after this year’s World AIDS Day that he was only 37 when he was diagnosed with HIV and is now 77.
But Major Ruranga and millions of others like him have science to thank, not prayers. The new wonder drug, lenacapavir, taken only twice a year, and is effective in stopping HIV infection has nothing to do with prayers.
Another piece of evidence undermines Apostle Lubega’s first claim. A man who has lived with HIV since the early 1990s told Bukedde TV (Luganda) that most of the HIV-positive people he prayed with at Kampala crusades later died after abandoning antiretroviral treatment on the advice of Pastor Balaby’ekkubo, who died in a car crash in 1995.
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Apostle Lubega’s second claim that he prays for the deaf to hear and the blind to see collapses under close scrutiny.
TV stations still help the blind and the deaf to follow news. If his prayers worked, hospitals, schools for the deaf and organisations for the visually impaired would be reporting sudden, unexplained recoveries.
Many people need religion and prayers to navigate life, but some pastors are letting them down—and the people do not seem to care.
🔴 Sunday Thought cuts through the noise of prayer, piety and superstition to ask the questions most people avoid. It discusses God, faith and religion—not to preach, but to probe, challenge and sometimes unsettle. Whether you believe, doubt or have stopped looking altogether, Sunday Thought will make you think, question and maybe even rethink everything you thought you knew about the divine—and about life itself.