… again.

Five Drown At Baptism Ceremony (The Independent Online/The South African Press Association; Oct 5)

The bodies of five people who drowned in a quarry during a baptism ceremony in Signal Hill in Mafikeng [South Africa] were retrieved on Monday, the North West public safety department said.

“The first body was retrieved at 9.20am, five minutes after the divers began their search,” spokesperson Lesiba Kgwele said.

The four congregants and their 45-year-old pastor from the New Faith Heaven in Majemantsho drowned on Sunday afternoon during a baptism ceremony.

Police divers retrieved the five bodies in 15 minutes.

Kgwele said that according to a witness Reverend Moses Mokhutshwane, the four in their 20s drowned while trying to rescue the pastor who appeared to be struggling to stand and drowned before the baptism began.

He said two of the deceased were siblings from Lomanyaneng.

“The other man jumped into the water in an attempt to rescue his brother who was drowning and also drowned.”

Kgwele said Mokhutshwane maintained that the church chose baptismal sites for their mystical powers though they knew that some of them were dangerous sites.

Superintendent Lesego Metsi said the dead were Bishop Stone Lemasa Mokwena, 26-year-old twins Joshua and Abram Mosweu, Tebogo Nakedi, 28, and 20-year-old Benjamin Nobula.

“The MEC of public safety Howard Yawa makes an appeal to communities not to swim or baptise in quarries as they are slippery.

“He also passed his condolences to the families of the deceased and to the church,” said Kgwele.

To learn a bit more about the many, many tragic cases in which people have died while trying to get closer to their gOd, see the entries I posted on April 22 and June 14.