Kampala — TUCKED away somewhere in Luzira is a mystical and controversial church which has been labelled a cult because of the strange ways of worship. George Wabweyo went there to uncover what lies behind the Legio Maria faith where they worship a black Jesus.

Several pairs of shoes cover the ground at the entrance of Saint Abraham's Church compound.

The churchyard is considered to be a holy place so it is an abomination to walk around it with shoes. I fear for my shoes, but a church member assures me that nobody will steal them.

"If anybody tries to steal them you will know who he is and he will bring the shoes back on his own," my guide tells me. I hesitantly take off my shoes and enter. A big red cross with half-burnt candles of all colours stands just two metres from the entrance.

All visitors to the church must kneel before it, make a sign of the cross and say a certain prayer. I ape my guide's every move due to my ignorance of the sect's practices.

There is a lot of speculation on whether Legio Maria is a credible Christian denomination.

Scanning the whole compound, I notice several flags of white, yellow and purple with crosses in the middle. Pigeons are all over the compound, and they do not show any signs of being timid or intimidated by the presence of humans.

From the stern glares pointed my way, my intruding presence has already been felt by the faithful.

Dirty jeans and a T-shirt do not quite cut it in a place where everyone is wearing colourful robes of blue, white, purple or yellow.

An altar boy moves around the churchyard swinging a tin of burning incense to purify the ground. I am told that once you move past the cross at the entrance, all your worldly troubles and demons disappear.

There are no seats in the church. Worshippers are supposed to kneel on the floor as a sign of humility before God.

The women occupy the left side of the church while the men occupy the right side. The two sexes do not mingle.

Straight ahead is the priest, who faces the congregation from a raised altar that is restricted to only him and the altar boys.

I kneel down next to a man with very long dreadlocks and several rosaries of different colours hanging from his neck. When asked why he wears dreadlocks, Micheal Ochieng says: "My hair gives me wisdom, spiritual strength and the ability to understand visions and foretell people's futures. We borrow this practice from Samson of the Bible whose strength lay in his hair."

A glance around the church reveals that almost everyone has something hanging from his or her neck. Some have pictures of either a bearded man or a black lady dressed as a nun.

I later learn that these are the images of Jesus and the Virgin Mary as they had appeared to them. Several members also had crosses shaped like swords which are allegedly used to exorcise demons.

The sermon in the church is conducted mainly in English, Luo, Swahili and Latin.

I expect a different kind of message in this church, but the priest echoes the messages that other churches preach on morality, a righteous life and loving your God.

He even quotes from the Bible, even though I notice that it is only him with the Holy Book in the whole church.

There are repetitive rituals of kneeling and standing punctuated by bloodcurdling screams and yells from members of the church who are allegedly filled with the Holy Spirit.

So what makes people call Legio Maria a cult? Is it the several pictures on the wall depicting the angels in different stages of battle with the devil? Or is it because they subscribe to a black Jesus? It is hard to tell at first glance so I decide to do more some more observation.

The songs are generally somber accompanied by constant chanting and yelling by the faithful. Incense is burned at strategic points such that the whole church is engulfed in thick clouds of smoke.

The chanting reaches fever pitch as a lady falls and starts writhing as if she is having an epileptic fit.

The whole church is worked up to frenzy as some in the congregation begin to speak in tongues (I am later told they are actually speaking Latin). The air is filled with screams, yodels and growls from the congregation.

Outside, a woman darts across the compound as though under the influence of alcoholwhile screaming and sprinkling holy water around. She too is said to be filled with the Holy Spirit!

I am so tense, that I expect someone to jump on me and exorcise demons from me.

At one point, a lady who is allegedly possessed by the Holy Spirit begins to talk in an authoritative, deep male voice, and everybody else bows in reverence as she talks. At times she makes a strange growling sound from the pit of her throat and I almost run out of the church at breakneck speed.

Later when the service ends (after Holy Communion and the sprinkling of holy water on the people), there seems to be excitement and euphoria.

My guide tells me that this is because the angels had appeared today in the church and that the black Jesus, who they refer to as Baba, was the one talking through the lady who had been possessed.

The lady, Gertrude Akello, is called "nabii" (prophetess) because of her commitment to prayer, ability to see into the future and mediate between people and God.

She tells me that she cannot recall what had happened to her earlier, but she is exhausted and she had been told that she was possessed by Baba (the black Jesus).

Nabbi Akello offers to counsel me and tell me my future. I am taken to a room - the black Mama Maria shrine - and made to hold a lit yellow candle while the prophetess chants and goes in and out of trances.

Waving a fly whisk around me, she begins speaking in tongues while making a guttural sound. She tells me: "Be patient with your boss and you will get a good job, and maybe you might drive a car soon."

Baba also tells her to tell me that he is the one who called me to his place and that if anyone else asks me to bring them, then I should do so. I notice that many people come to consult her and she talks to them with a lot of authority, either rebuking them or ordering them about. All this time she was talking in a deep male voice.

Having witnessed all this mystical drama, I decide to dig deeper for insight. Historically, Legio Maria was formed as a resistance movement against hypocritical and discriminative white missionaries, in Western Kenya, who did not want African catechists to be priests.

It was founded by Simeo Melkio Ondeto a Roman Catholic African who decided to form an Afro-centric church. He claimed that God had appeared to him and though he never said it himself, most of his followers felt that he was the black reincarnation of Jesus.

However Fr. Kennedy Caleb Ochieng, the priest of St. Abraham's Church, denies the political angle and gives a purely religious account.

"Legio Maria has its origins in the Catholic mission in 1936. It was a way of prayer and those who practiced it were called the Legion of Mary. However the Catholic missionaries kept it as their own secret, and practiced it using a very powerful rosary called the Catena along with saying prayers from a book called Tessera.

In 1962 the Virgin Mary, having got fed up with the white fathers monopolising the Catena, decided to introduce it to the Africans," Ochieng explains.

According to him, Mary came in the form of a woman called Mama Omolo Kanyonja Regina Owich who wandered around looking for her lost son. People would ridicule and insult her by calling her a lunatic.

One day she sent the Holy Spirit to a mission church where she had been stoned and called insane. The spirit sent the mission into confusion as its followers and occupants began to follow her.

They walked for a long time until she finally encountered her long lost son who was now grown up. They saluted each other in terms which would later become the Legio Maria way of greeting. The woman said "oyaore" (the sky has opened) and the son said "oyaore mama".

Having met each other finally, they led the large following to Kwero hill in southern Nyanza (Got Kwero).

The Holy Spirit allegedly descended upon the people and they saw angels coming down while singing praises to God. That was the day the people saw Baba Simeo Melkio Ondeto as the reincarnation of Jesus Christ.

There were several claims that Ondeto resurrected countless people and performed lots of miracles which made him popular.

A new faith was born and it spread fast. They borrowed a lot from Catholicism like Holy Communion, prayer in Latin and belief in purgatory. However, they insist on praying with the Catena, a rosary which has sets of beads in threes standing for the Trinity.

The members do not eat pork, or drink alcohol or do drugs and they adhere to the 10 Commandment.

On the other hand, the Catholic Church is against lay people using the Catena, which is said to have superior power.