COHESION AND COHERENCE IN SELECTED SERMONS OF CHURCH LEADERS: ARCHBISHOP OBINNA AND LATE PASTOR BIMBO ODUKOYA

Abstract

Although religious discourse has been given research attention, language as used by Christian leaders especially in Nigeria has not enjoyed wide linguistic investigation. This work is poised to investigate the texture of selected Christian sermons by notable church leaders with a view to laying bare the cohesive ingredients these leaders have used to bring about texture and coherence in the sermons and, as a result, command large followership among the Christian faithful. Two sermons each of Archbishop Anthony Obinna and (Late) Pastor Mrs. Bimbo Odukoya are purposively selected and some utterances were subjected to descriptive analysis relying on insights from the Hallidayan Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). Analysis reveals intricately woven and coherent texts which are only made possible as a result of the church leaders’ unique deployment of such cohesive ingredients as reference, substitution, ellipsis, conjunction and lexical cohesion in the texts. With these linguistic tools intricately deployed, leaders are able to command ample followership while discharging their spiritual duties. The paper affirms that cohesion and coherence are necessities for preachers who wish to command spiritual leadership among their followers.