This write up is not intended to be academical or an intellectual
attempt at redefining religion or how it is perceived everywhere. This
is with the intention to inculcate the whole essence of what we believe
and how we believe it. I am not addressing my message to those who see
religion as what you portend outside more than what you should be
inside. Wait a minute! My audience is actually the people I just
mentioned.
People who have intricately misrepresented their beliefs and
religion. People, who are cloaked with everything externally edifying
but totally undignified inside. People, who have believed a lie, adopted
it as lifestyle and profoundly make themselves examples of what
significant religious life should be. I am pointing my arrows of love to
the great masses of our people who on daily basis never bow down to
reflect on their lifestyles in relation to what their Holy Book says or
taught. People who are in grandiose deception of lusts for life, money
and religion. Yes, lust for religion. They are professional prostitutes
of the letter of the Books and completely defiant to the spirit of it.
The Holy Books to them is a covering of their menace and a shield of
their atrocities. I speak about a people, though so many, who are lost
in their faith and relished in their misunderstanding of what religion
was intended for in the first place. People with big robes and attires
that are reflective of certain religion but only for show.
I call them Religious Las Vegas.
May I define religion from the dictionary before attempting to infer
what it means to me? Merriam Webster dictionary has this to say about
Religion:
A. Service and worship of God or a supernatural
B. Commitment or a devotion to religious faith
C. Personal set or institutionalized system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices
D. A scrupulous conformity or conscientiousness to beliefs
E. Beliefs held to with ardor and faith in service of God or deity
Every of the above points to a supernatural agent called God or Allah
in the two dominant religion in Nigeria- Islam and Christianity.
Another common attribute in the definitions is the sets of practices,
services, attitudes, worships and beliefs that are in consonant with the
different religion. The third common denomination is that Religion
requires devotion, a commitment, actually scrupulous conformity and
conscientiousness on the part of its adherents. Religion demands ardor
and faith for it to be relevant. Taking a cue from the above then, it
becomes obvious that people can easily be identified who are religious.
There is the external part of the requirements of religion which are the
works of it. Anyone can fake that. However, there is the part of it
that imposes commitment and devotion, conformity and a hearty conscience
to the dictates of the religion. The externalities are there, with its
deception and hypocrisy. The internalities of religion is what is
grossly lacking in our society in Nigeria.
A friend of mine told a story of a white guy who came to Nigeria to
visit him. The expatriate, as we call them, went to Church with my
friend who is a manager of one the international conglomerate industries
in Nigeria. It was a big church with a lot of attendance. The visitor
was so unsettled during the service, which was a concern to his host, he
was seen looking bewildered, frustrated and infuriated at the same
time. After the service was over, his host asked him what went wrong
with the service and his attitude. This is what the visitor told my
friend verbatim;
“I see religiosity so outspoken on the faces of the entire congregation
but it was impure, ungodly and full of pretense. Can you please explain
to me why the gap seen outside the church is also here in the church? I
see the super rich and the unhealthy poor. I see a gulf between them
too. What exactly has religion done to man or vice versa?”
The truth is we have so much of religion that is external but lack
the internal truth to uphold us. This happens in the Mosque too. We have
people who recite the creed of their religion very well but only listen
to the voice of their greed and lust. We have Pastors and Imams, who
are so embellished in their absurdities and recklessness, but with a lot
of external influences, who at the same time are redefining what our
religion should be. People this day simply follow those who have imposed
themselves as spiritual leaders and mentor without asking questions.
They are told what to do and how to do it. These hypocritical leaders
have taken religion out of reach of the masses of our people. They know
it all, and should not be questioned. Nigerians have relapsed into the
trap of religious deception so badly that it has become a way of life.
We now have a new culture imbibed by the false teachings that are
pervading our psyche and society. Violence is now been used to define
Islam and greed is defining Christianity. Clerics now see personal
fights and disagreements as what their followers must engage in for
relevance. When my pastor is not your pastor’s friend, then we are sworn
enemies. If my Ulama is disengaged from yours then we have to fight it
out for reckoning. What an absurd! What a travesty!!
Our cities are riddled with all kinds of evil and our political
leaders are also our religious superiors in the church and mosque. They
seat “so close to God” in the special seats and just simply sleep off
the message when seldomly preached. The carriage needed to suggest
concern in our plight is long gone with the winds. We are left alone on
the street to fend for ourselves what the nation should have provided
us, yet our leaders in the church and mosque who have it all, suggests
we wait on God. Some even preached contentment with poverty along
reliance on the rich. The question that begs to be answered is, who made
those who are wealthy in our midst rich? How did they get wealthy?
They stole from our commonwealth and then rubbed it in on us by
dropping pennies on our lap as wages or donations or helps. Who is
fooling who?
The problem here is not all on the leaders but also on the followers
who hitherto has refused to ask legitimate questions from their leaders.
I am sick and tired of religiously cloaked liars who in their quest
for beatitudes of this world take advantage of the poor and use them as
puns when there is the need for it. I have no respect for any man based
on what decorations you have around your neck or your head, or the title
that is attached to your name; if the basic devotion and piety that
punctuates our religion is absent.
Where are our religious leaders in the face of incessant religious
mayhem that has attended this nation for years? What they teach is how
to retaliate and seek revenge. They take it a notch further, by teaching
more on the thin string of difference that exist between Christians and
Muslims. I agree that some of them do not realize that we have so much
more in common than in difference. Just like life itself, my neighbor is
different, but I have a command to keep peace with him in love. The two
religions teach that for God’s sake.
Jihad which both religions recommends is being redefined from what
the Holy Books say. The twisted minded man who claims Islam as his
religion sees it as mayhem against ‘others’ who are not conformed to his
way of thoughts. Twisted. Christians defines it as hatred for the
Muslims because “they are out to kill us”. Jihad is simply a linguistic
word that connotes internal (more than external) fight against the
‘demons’ in ourselves (self) who makes the government of God impossible
in us. Jihad is when the spirit of love, patience and forbearance
subdues the carnality of hatred, intolerance and disrespect. Jihad is
self-control.
Enough is enough. Let all of our Religious Las Vegas go into their
closet of self-evaluation and come out with the certificate of self
discipline and control in order to make religion what God intended it
for. Let every religious leader show the proof of internal sanctity and
piety before they impose it on others.
Let us arise and take our religion back from the religious cloaked deceivers.
Olumide G Adeyinka is an Ordained Minister, Businessman, Freelance
Writer and Founder of NIGARD (Nigerians Against Religious Divide).
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