On October 20, 2025, social media went agog after a video of some mourners, particularly a middle-aged man lying prostrate and seemingly ‘worshipping’, in what appears to be a circular rainbow around the sun at the 40-day observance for the late Apostle Kwadwo Safo Kantanka.
The late Apostle was not only the founder and leader of the Kristo Asafo Church, but he was also regarded as a ‘living genius’ in Ghana.
As Ghana and Africa envision being at par in technological advancements with their counterparts in Western countries, Apostle Safo Kantanka arguably led the vision for Ghana.
From developing talking vehicles, toilets, to building armoured vehicles and aircrafts locally, his brainpower earned him many respects from diplomas and the citizenry.
In fact, he was a ‘demigod’ to the thousands of congregants in his church.
It was, therefore, not surprising to see his church members celebrate what they believed was his revelation to them since his departure in such a spectacle.
The church members have suffered social media ridicule for their actions on the day.
But I am not here to judge anyone. I am simply here to conduct my duties as a journalist to explain what happened in the humid skies.
That day was not the only time this ‘circular rainbow’ has been beheld in Ghana.
In fact, the first time I saw one was in 2012 when I was only a JHS 2 student in Obuasi.
Just like the members of Kristo Asafo who reckoned the mystery in the skies was how their leader wanted to reveal his presence to them, I only reckoned it was the second coming of Jesus Christ after my friends showered me with some stories about the end times.
But really, what was that in the skies?
Similar to rainbows you see in the skies occasionally, this is known as ‘Halo’, otherwise known as the ‘22-degree Halo’.
A halo is a ring or light that forms around the sun or moon as the sun’s or moonlight refracts off ice crystals present in a thin veil of cirrus clouds. It is usually seen as a bright, white ring, although sometimes it can have colour.
Imagine the sun as a white torchlight thrown into a dark room, and in between the beam of light sits a glass prism – a transparent optical structure with a flat, polished surface.
As the ray of light passes through the optical structure, it is separated into the rainbow colours – red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet (ROY G BIV). This scientific principle is known as refraction – essentially the redirection of a wave [in this case light] as it passes through one medium to another.
Now, as the sunlight hits the surface of the earth, it is interfered with by the ice crystals of the clouds – typically cirrus or cirrostratus – suspended in the atmosphere. This visible light is then separated at a 22-degree angle into the rainbow colours in a disc-like fashion in the sky.
This is simply the physics behind whatever happened in the sky.
It is usually common in colder regions of the earth, but in hotter climates, they usually appear during the rainy seasons.
Some schools of thought have associated this phenomenon with Ixion’s punishment in Greek mythology.
But appearing on the 40-day observance of the Apostle, “is that a coincidence of an unexplainable mystic which shows the church has lost a true gem and a demigod to the heavens?”
I will leave that to the Spiritualists and prophets to explain or unravel the mystery.
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