Should You Pray At The Altar Of Preach?

What Is This Thing?

In the Cleveland, Ohio area, four prophetesses -- female spiritual leaders who believe they have divine powers to minister to Christians -- face challenges as they try to train the protégées they've each identified as having prophetess potential.

When Is It On?

Fridays at 10 PM on Lifetime.

Why Was It Made Now?

Between Preachers' Daughters, Preachers Of L.A., and Preachers Of Detroit, charismatic Christians are having a reality-show moment -- which stands to reason, since their style of religious practice is very dramatic and thus compelling to the camera.

What's Its Pedigree?

It's produced by CORE Media Group, which owns 19 Entertainment, the company behind American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance, but obviously the prophetesses themselves are not exactly known quantities in the entertainment world.

...And?

There's always inherent interest in getting a look inside a world one knows nothing about: having grown up Catholic-ish, I am not familiar with church services where hands are laid on and demons are cast out. Also, considering that the series revolves around people of faith ministering to the most troubled members of the flock, I appreciate that the pilot includes footage of the prophetesses and protégées speaking frankly about their own past misdeeds; it's valuable in this context to remind viewers that one doesn't need to have lived an entirely blameless life to play an active and meaningful role in a Christian congregation.

...But?

The problem is that the Real Housewives franchise is such a juggernaut that now its tropes are infecting reality shows that don't even belong to it. Like Pretty Wicked Moms before it, it's a Lifetime lookalike, also about obnoxious women talking behind each other's backs about the big events at which they're all about to have to spend time together. Except the context in which they're all being moved around is this very specific version of Christian faith. So basically, imagine a situation where the New York Housewives are getting ready to attend an event -- except instead of a party to celebrate one of them getting her face on a magazine no one's heard of, it's a church service where people are trying to solve problems in their lives by having what they believe to be literal demons cast out of them.

In other words: you know how arrogant the Real Housewives are -- how firmly they all believe all their opinions are facts and nothing can shake them? Now imagine how much harder to take Bethenny Frankel would be if she were convinced she'd been granted special, nearly magical powers by God Himself. It's the kind of show where someone can look into the camera and say "I have brought someone back from the dead. I've even laid my hands on people who didn't even know they had demon activity going on in their mind. I want to intimidate the Devil."

So like...sometimes it's weird? But sometimes it's very familiar. And sometimes it's both at once, as when prophetess Taketa and her protégée Rebecca get into a fight about Rebecca having taken a towel covered in Taketa's holy preaching sweat to a luxury car dealership, convinced that said towel gave her the power to ask for a car and have them give her one. (This is a real conversation that really happens.) The details aren't something you've seen the Richards sisters battle over, but ultimately, a bitch fight is a bitch fight and you're either into that or you're not.

...So?

I'm not. The curiosity factor of finding out more about exactly how these prophetesses' faith works didn't, for me, cancel out how bored I was by their contrived disagreements and distracting weaves. But if you really love the Housewives, you might like this unofficial twist on the format.