AFRICA remains the only Continent that officially recognizes foreign religions and sponsors holy lands outside Africa officially at the expense of its own. As if God and holy place never existed in Africa, foreign terrorists designated their tumultuous cities as such. No place suffers more from religious terrorists for centuries. Yet, inferiority complex will not let Africans shed the yoke.
Professor Obama provoked another debate about jihad and crusade recently making those of us wrapped in religion uncomfortable. Interestingly the discomfort was not limited to Christians and Muslims. Hindu and Buddhists also protested. The Professor was chastised for bringing up Crusade that happened hundreds of years ago, compared to the Jihad terrorists right now.
If Nigerian or Arab leader condemns a religion regardless of states or people, they would deny the state the most needed boots. Egypt seeks Nigeria’s cooperation against Muslim terrorists. They claimed Obama refused to condemn and declare war against Muslim religion as extreme religious terrorists or by any other name they want him to use. It is then and only then can the Christians defeat Muslim extremists. They want another Crusade v. Jihad war.
It never occurred to them that those needed in the fore front as boots on the ground are also Muslims. Ancient atrocities came in the name of religions and civilization. Empires that were earlier than those of Europe and Asia were looted and destroyed by Arabs and Europeans in the name of religions. African names were changed because they were devil’s name to English and Arabic names. When they were told that Chukwu means God, they said no, it was devil’s name. So they gave us Godson as a new name we must answer.
The missionaries were the first to come converting natives from evil worshippers to religions of mass destruction. Then came the traders and the merchants followed by the administrators of governments. The history of religion, especially Christians and Muslims in Africa have plunged the Continent into darkness from which it has not recovered. Slaves were blessed on their way out after they were sold by their own chiefs for pittance. Gold were exchanged for mirrors.
Nobody in his right mind would justify the acts of jihadists that use the name of religion to kill and maim their own people in order to impose sharia on them. These same sharia laws do not apply to their lascivious way of life. Indeed, some of their hostages never see them praying or with Koran. But we spotted an expensive Rolex watch on the wrist of their leader of ISIL. When some folks of faith pray, morning, noon and night, we wonder how much sin they committed.
The similarity between conservative Christians and Muslims is displayed by their intolerance for opposite view. They are the only ones that know the right way to God and how to get to heaven. Revolt against Catholic Church and persecution of the Protestants must not be duplicated by any religious sect in the name of jihad or crusade. Victims of today or yesterday are the ones that know how it feels.
Man is naturally born aware of good and evil. Whenever a wrongful act is displayed, even a child displays a sense of guilt if corrected. Evil deeds become a weapon when used to dominate others and make them subservient to the wishes and caprices of the oppressors. Religion and politics are convenient tools used to suppress and justify guilt. As nobody wants to be subjected to the same cruelty perpetrated on others, oppressors justify evil on oppressed as less than self.
Women seeking abortions are still in fear of those killing doctors in the name of religion. Late Dr. Morgentaler of Canada, Dachau concentration camp and Lódz Ghetto survival fought Christians in courts and on the streets for safe medical abortion. Christians sprayed Abortion clinics with blood and hunted doctors like animals. We forget that cross burning is used today to intimidate groups of people because of their skins color or were Protestants, Anarchists and Communists.
These evil acts are too uncomfortable to discuss by the same people claiming to be so righteous in the day only to dawn their Ku Klux Klan robes at night hanging humans on the cross. They do not want to be compared or put on the same level as the jihadists and crusaders. They should allow their victims to speak for themselves, in case they know the difference between the lives taken, abused or destroyed by people that have acquired killer instincts in the name of religion.
There is no place this Christian insensitivity was more displayed than during the police shooting of black men and boys in United States. Police want to tell their Mayor what to tell his son that happens to be black when he encounters police on the street. The same advise black fathers have been giving their sons, that had been repeated by the four stars General Colin Powell and the President of United States. No, it is the police that shoot that know better than the victims.
In some years and decades, there will be those telling us it was in the past. No need to bring it up again. But we cannot blame them. There were Christian talking heads on televisions telling and interpreting what we saw with our own eyes, as long as it corroborated with the statement of the shooter and the witness that claimed victim was charging at the police like a bull. After all, they were educated Christians talking forensic science and law used to confused biased jury.
Even some left wing liberals did not like the way the professorial President used crusade; falling for the same argument as the conservatives. The fact is conservatives will find faults no matter how President Obama puts it. The most charitable they can say is, they agree with what he said but it was the way he said it. There has never been a right way for them. All they needed was a sentence they could pick, blew it up and made it a scandal for the public.
Too often in the history of the world, the oppressed have been told their reward is in heaven, not in this evil world. It is in the same world where the evil is perpetrated by the most trusted, where rewards for the rich and oppressors are collected. Bob Jones University, Bible College in Greenville, South Carolina only recently allowed black and white students to date. A reminder that looking at a white woman is forbidden but white men had liberty to black women.
No Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist or Ogun worshippers have monopoly on good people. We have them in all religions, just as we have a few but malignant people everywhere.
