'Those of you who Refuse to Repent, God Will Judge You': An Exploration of Power and Ideology in Selected Online Christian Sermons

Extant studies on power and ideology rely on Critical Discourse Analysis, while the application of Transitivity to uncover these constructs has received less scholarly attention. This study engages Halliday and Matthiessen’s (2014) Transitivity framework to examine assertive expressions in Nigerian Christian religious discourse, with a view to accounting for how the elements of the theory encode ideology, project power relations, and regulate social behaviour. Using purposive sampling, nine sermon excerpts from Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook were analyzed. Findings reveal that verbal, relational, existential, and material processes are utilised to project an ideology of collaborative leadership where both constituted authority and other social agents share responsibility for societal well-being. The analysis also demonstrates how transitivity constructs power relations by positioning God as the ultimate authority and the preacher as the legitimate mediator of divine judgement. The study also highlights the consequences of opposing divine authority and engaging in wickedness, offences, and immoral acts. The research contributes to works on religious discourse by demonstrating the usefulness of Transitivity in analysing power and ideology, while offering insights on the role of religious discourse in promoting moral conduct.