The smoke from the Ozubulu church shooting may have subsided but the after-effect lingers on – in the homes of the dead and the maimed; and in the traumatised minds of Nigerians and humanity in general.
The piece sent in the media last week by a certain Revd Gbadegesin on the subject, provokes not-so-fresh a controversy that questions the propriety of the church and society as a whole; but it has compelled a crying necessity why we, as a people, must reappraise the church and whether the jettisoning of our traditional religions across the land for the colonial church was really well thought out in the first place.
The Blackman governed his community effectively well against internal and external assault before the advent of the white man, who first came on territorial conquest and used trade and commerce and then the church, to completely conquer the human mind. It was from then on, that we started to detest ourselves, our traditions, cultures and religions.
Nigerians from the 60s would no longer touch our cultures and deities with long feet poles but were quick to embrace anything white because our European conquerors had succeeded in colouring our vision and thoughts so much that most of our people now believed anything white was good while almost everything black was evil.
Jesus appeared to us as a white man and Satan looked horribly black that many of our women embraced bleaching and distanced themselves from anything black. Our traditional religions began to fade from our consciousness because we had unwittingly made them darkish in our minds to obscure their true relevance. And, women begat us and such is their ability to convince, that our fathers caved in to their amorous luring.
Ifa, in its purity, for example, was said to be ever truthful and factual; the reason why in celebrating the deity, they usually sing something like: “ifa ki ‘paro, ifa ki ‘se’ke” to affirm its honesty. Kings were selected through the instrumentality of ifa divination, and such selection was usually faultless. But, not anymore – for two reasons.
One, its earliest adherents knew the details off-head and they were not literate enough to know how to write these formulas down for easy reference as well as for posterity. These formulary died with them; and the notes of the few smattering lettered ones gathered dust and parts of them eaten up by termites and and other pests, if not rodents, leaving their inheritors with mutilated notes, in which guesswork was used to fill in the faded or damaged portions of the notes. That was the beginning of the reduced potency of the herbs, concoctions, incantations of the powerful charms, amulets and other medicines of old!
Second reason is that teenagers were excluded from the inner temples of these deities because of the older people’s presumption that these teens were too gullible and immature to keep secrets. The position of the older adherents and practitioners of these traditional religions was however unsupported and contradicted by their own saying that “Igbo oro t’omode o ki nwo, ma parun ni”. The shrine children are forbidden from entering, will become obliterated with time, since there will be no successors for the adherents to keep up, maintain or sustain the practice; as the older people must wither away and die at some point, willy nilly.
The potency of Ogun, god of iron, as well as Esu, or Satan, as indeed other deities across the country called Nigeria, was such that no misdemeanour of any type was said to escape the prying eyes of these gods, for appropriate and instant punishment. But Christianity brought by the conquerors, changed all that; and it emboldened culprits to steal blind and kill with compulsive craziness without any such fear of being apprehended, not to talk of being sanctioned and punished.
With the Bible and the movement away from Egypt, Mosaic law was replaced with meekness; and society exploited that. It is why today’s practitioners in the Church became so brazen in their defiance of ethical and moral code that many pastors have sunk into the indecent nadir that whoever makes them the cornerstone of their beliefs, will end up in ‘soup’, later, if not sooner.
To be fair, some of our men of God are decent and conform with standard Christian practice on morality and piety; but such can be counted at one’s finger tip. The remainder fit into Fela Anikulapo’s categorisation of damned devils in cassock. They are those who provided the fertile ground for churches to become “shooting ranges” where criminals come to settle personal scores and where innocent souls are blighted with compulsion.
How I wish Bros Kongi, our own Professor Wole Soyinka, will illuminate this discussion further, on why he prefers to swear by the Ogun or Sango than the Bible or the Koran!
To be sure, my position on the issue of religion is clear and straightforward. My father, in his life time, always admonished people that there could be no half measures in matters of religion. If you choose to be an idol worshipper, get involved totally; just as you should, if you prefer to practice Islam or Christianity.
I chose to be a Christian, because it’s mode of worship is not as complex and confusing as they do in the traditional shrines, which I was privileged to witness as an impressionable teenager, escorting a maternal grand uncle, way back in the 50s and 60s.
At the beginning of my Christian faith, I fell into the shenanigans of some so-called men of God, but not anymore. I stand resolute in and with the God of man now, because as He made me believe in His Holy Book, that His house is a strong tower; where the righteous runneth into and get saved. In truth and given my life experiences in these odd 67 years earthly sojourn, I can truthfully proclaim that my God is alive and on His throne!
Muhammed Ali resurrects in Edo
Pugilism comes to the hallowed chamber. That sounds odd because an hallowed chamber, especially that of Edo State House of Assembly, is meant to be a serious, albeit sober, laboratory where laws are made for good and orderly governance.
But, on a Monday, regarded as a day set aside to chart a new, purposeful week for the serious-minded, the law makers of Edo decided to get lawless, and took the laws into their hands.
Perhaps because their pay-packets are not as hefty as those of world renown boxers, they turned the most sacred part of the hallowed chamber – the Speaker’s corner – into the ‘roped square’ and in a fit of fury, exchanged wild and measured punches, akin to the unforgettable “Rumble in the Jungle” world heavyweight boxing encounter between the legendary Muhammed Ali and his mortal foe, George Foreman in Zaire.
If prize money was at stake, the lawless lawmakers would have made away with billions in naira. Some of them threw wild and inaccurate blows as if to outdo Joe Frazier after being punch-drunk by Ali’s stinging jabs and his famous rat-a-tat punches. Some in the video clips were “fleet of feet and slashing of fists” and one, pummelled with a heavy combination of blows, turned into a wild wrestler for whom anything in sight was useable; as he threw a wooden chair around wildly.
Whatever the cause, it was an ugly and shameful spectacle from a city of culture and beauty. I pray the revered monarch of the ancient kingdom did not watch the film; as the sight was capable of drawing his ire and a curse for which there may be no cure.
