The tradition of deploying analytical tools and methods to challenge settled religious orthodoxy has been long coming. Adherents of the established order have always held critical analyses or inquiries into “settled” values of religion as heretical or ungodly. It is generally held that scholarly, intellectual or academic searches into matters of faith can only compound our understanding of revealed orthodoxy and leave us totally bereft of the true or inspired reason for its practice. Over the ages however, religious orthodoxy has received defiant challenges that have produced, in a progressive fashion, further orthodoxies. In spite of the abhorrence of organised religion for cerebral inquiries into its form, content or mode, it has, probably more than any subject matter, received serious intellectual assaults or attacks on its normative validity, its theoretical thrusts and its philosophical underpinnings. It has been unable to stem the tidal waves of reasoned critique. It is to the eternal credit of its resilience, however, that is preachment, transcendental values and mores are embedded in the inner recesses of our individual consciousness. The universality of our humanity is underscored by the shared values of our sense of propriety, of right or wrong, and/or of a supreme order.
Some are wont to disclaim the centrality or appropriateness of organised faith in the affairs of our private, individual or social life. These ones reflect concerning a progressive decline in social morality, parental authority or, even, marital fidelity in spite of the upsurge in the activities of organised religion as indicative of the failure or un-necessity of faith–based institutions or convocations. Their position is empirically buttressed by the absence of the true faith values of piety, self-denial, moderation and good judgment, among others, in the lives of faith leaders. Church leaders, for instance, are known in their large number, for ostentatious life style, impious carriage, crude acquisitiveness or lustfulness, etc. The family unit, the most fundamental segment of our social set-up, which requires to be protected away from negative influences is exposed to the defilement of its soul by what it sees or perceives of the desultonness of what should be its compass or direction into goodly conduct or acceptable behaviour.
The thematic focus of this article revolves around the visible and surreptitious outward deeds of men and women of faith contrary to the solemn dictates or prescription of their faith; their posturing which contrast gravely with the presumed love message of their faith. Men and women of faith self-gratifyingly cite the scriptures, draw allegoric parallels between our lives and the life to come and charge us to be of good or Godly behaviour so we may inherit the blessings of the hereafter. But generally and most dis-appointingly, these ones are different from their congregations only by a hair’s breadth, if ever. Church leaders’ grandstanding notwithstanding, the people are aghast why elementary principles of living which men of faith preach inexorably, are practiced by them more in the breach than in their observance even in the fierce stare of the congregation. The Atlantic Slave Trade, for example, was allowed to exist co-terminously with the Christian religion for about 450 years. Our morality was lulled to sleep for all that period even as slave-owning dealers were the curious prime propagators of the ethos or values of Islam; of the presumed universality of the human kind all through the ages or before and during the Trans Saharan Trade. There is a requirement of a fundamental protest against the concept of unquestioning obedience by insisting on the relevance or importance of our own moral or rational assent to what is commanded to be obeyed. Our fear of being visited with misery or cant as a result of our deviation from societal norms particularly in societies where religion has been in a position of authority is solely responsible for the pervasive confusion which makes it difficult to discern high ground morality from muscular or organised religion or even religious fundamentalism. The power and integrity in the claim of fundamentalism, we must remind ourselves, subsist only in its sentimental effect not in unyielding rigour. The dilemma for us is how to balance our aversion for intellectual slavery occasioned by the deviousness of the preachment of religious leaders with our recognition that religion is a way of delivering some people from some debilitating influence or consequences.
By their activities, the various faith-based organisations may have accentuated a new sense of inequality deprivation, injustice, etc. even as members of their congregations, for instance, are unable to afford the egregious high tuition and other fees charged by schools owned by their denominations. School or college fees in such private institutions are on the roof top and so un-affordable by the same people who regularly contribute their widow’s mite which cumulatively boosts the effective liquidity of the owner or proprietor organisations and gives them more room to optimise returns on investment by establishing more and more schools and colleges in profitable locations. It therefore follows that the mediation of the church, for example, in the area of education or skill acquisition is not free or munificent; it is arguably at a cost to a significant segment of the population. This however does not in any way disturb or derogate from the validity of the epistemological truths in the canon of the message of the church.
Organised religion is presumed to offer succour for people. It has therefore found a natural habitat among people who are naturally opposed to tyrannical exactions which are the order of the times. The tendency towards syncretism has emerged whereby a member of a faith congregation could combine regular consultation of seers and magicians with his rigorous or unfailing attendance of Church ministrations all for combined effect. This practice is pervasive or general. A strong, emerging trend towards ecstasy and puritanism will also be noticed as one of the features of organised religion in Nigeria today. This may be understood as a response or reaction to the cold formalism and lax morality of orthodoxy. It is in a sense a reaction against syncretism of the “wrong sort” It may also be noted as a reassertion of the vigorous elements of the indigenous traditions which imported religion can ill afford to ignore or ignore to its detriment or diminution.
The important point to make at this juncture is that there is a dialectical relationship between faith-based organisations [as represented by the church] and the state. The continuing decline in societal values properly situates the church and promotes her strong social and moral conscience credentials. She is succour to the poor and needy who are pointedly consoled or strengthened by the Magnificat and the beatitude, “Blessed are the poor.” She is also the veritable remembrancer drawing attention time and again to the abysmal human failure to learn from lessons of history. Church leaders may have unnecessarily garnished their practice with flourish, panache and high drama in their quest for the resolution of some of the intractable social and moral problems besetting Nigeria. What may however not be denied them are their evident sincerity, clear headedness and undaunting ardour or vitality in the pursuit of their charge or objective.
By their own deft positioning, Nigerian Pastors have earned access to the leading currents of thoughts and trends from Europe, America (especially the USA) and, lately, South-east Asia concerning the desired place of Christianity in a world bewildered or threatened by terrorism, insurgency and up-beat religious intolerance. These external influences have both positive and negative effects on our local scene as evidenced by instances of the feverish penchant by Nigerian Pastors to acquire aircrafts, jets, helicopters and other supersonic modes of peregrination in the character and predilection of America’s Oral Roberts, Morris Cerullo, Kenneth Haggin, etc. who are reportedly prevailing or travailing in the heat of revival fire.
Happily, we live in an age in which we do not instinctively obey orders from above (“above” being a euphemism for transcendental heavens) even as justifications are now required to be offered for moral restraints upon individuals. Paradoxically, our era is also one in which restraint is recognised as a necessity for demythologising previous moral traditions even as we strive to construct new traditions so we may continue to earn our appellation as “homo sapiens.”
About the Author
Rotimi-John, a Nigerian lawyer and commentator on public affairs, who writes articles for Vanguard Nigeria news Agency.