Religious Hypocrisy in Contemporary Nigeria (Part 2)

‎Dear Dolapo Akinola-Omojola,

"All issues emanate from the spiritual realm, only the spirit has answers to all things. Wisdom is a spiritual exercise that is translated to the mind and the ability of the mind to interpret its message is understanding-which is a function mind/mental function. All messages transmitted to the brain start from the mind, and those that go to the mind is created from the spirit realm. The spirit understands all things because it transcends brain and comprehension otherwise you and I will understand the source of the sun and moon and what keeps life consistent on earth. All things have their source in the Spirit."
Dolapo Akinola-Omojola, November 28th 2011

Permit me to ask you some few questions regarding your comment to Rolu’s earlier comment, which I will reproduce as I go on.

 There appear to me the time-tested argument on ‘mind’, ‘spirit’, ‘soul’, ‘brain’, and ‘body’ argument, which no philosopher has been able to answer in your comment. In fact, it will be a great one for me to refrain from thinking that you are in a great confusion (you may not even know) as to where all these existential phenomena are in the human frame. For instance, there is the simple error that because the brain is in the head, the mind is in the heart or other parts of the body, which would technically elicit another question: where is the soul in the human frame? In relation to all these, one can also ask: which of these body parts, if we agree that they are inside of man, is the seat or abode of the spirit?

For anything to be spiritual, it must come external to the human body, as the human body is governed by the mental part of man, which technically relates to all body parts as against the Yorùbá/African mentality of ORI, head, as the governor of the body. Science has told us that dendrites, neurons, pupils, and motor nerves pick data from the outside the human body either through touch, sight or feel and transmit them at more than the speed of light to the brain for processing, where they become information. Because all these begin and complete in split seconds, we take no notice and we confuse everything that emanates from man as necessarily the activities of the brain or head. Hence, the Yorùbá would say: ‘Ori re kop e”, even if it is your eyes or hair that failed to transmit the right message and thereby getting wrong results out of your brain. We can pardon the confusion, especially because until the body is brain-dead, science will not also declare a body dead, a situation which can be confused as the verdict from the most important part of the body. Despite science’s seeming error in this, I want to tell you that until the brain cannot pick data from other body parts, it cannot die.

I think if you apply this analysis to your comment, you will see how confusing those beautiful words of yours are. For instance, if all matters emanate from the spiritual realm and we cannot say, in particular, in which parts of the body is this spiritual realm; then we will run into two more troubles. One, is this spiritual realm within the body? If so, how much of its functions and activities are guided by insights from other parts of the body? Like the brain, which depends on other body-parts for its activities, is the spirit insulated from other body parts? Unless you want to preach, I see no yes or no answer open to you. If we argue that the spiritual realm is external to the body, then we will sacrifice human agency in all matters and man would stop being moral agents, responsible for their actions. Yes, we have evidence of these in our daily lives. When Bode George stole our money, he also said ‘ise esu ni’ and so also Cecilia Ibru and you and me. Once, we are caught, pant down, in our evil ways; we pass the bulk. I remember other variants of this: ‘awon aye lo nse’ and by extension, ‘amuwa olorun ni’. So, where is this your spirit realm and how does it link up with man? Don’t play Okotie here by telling me 'through the spirit'. It won’t sell.

Second point of your intervention is that: “Wisdom is a spiritual exercise that is translated to the mind and the ability of the mind to interpret its message is understanding-which is a function mind/mental function.” What is wisdom? Simply put: the application of right knowledge at the right time. How can this be spiritual? By your name, I gather that you are Yorùbá, but your comment is in English language; did you learn English Language in the spirit or in school? Were you told in the spirit to respond to Rolu’s comments? To worsen the matter, you just committed a blue murder by asserting that wisdom is spiritual, as it is tantamount to saying that only the spiritual are wise. Please, be corrected: knowledge gives wisdom and enlightenments and it is not a function of any spirit. It is just application of right knowledge and at the right time.

Your third gaffe is that “All messages transmitted to the brain start (sic) from the mind, and those that go to the mind is created from the spirit realm.” This is a big lie. Sensory nerves, dendrites, motor nerves, neurons, etc. are the means through which messages (even if you want to play the pastor by saying spiritual messages) are transmitted to the brain. You are confusing ‘brain’ and ‘mind’ again. Our ‘hearts’ are not our ‘minds’ and the heart is not the seat of the mind. Your argument can only sell if the mind is also external to the body or an abstract place elsewhere in the space. But if we agree that they are in human beings, but we don’t know where they are, we can then raise the argument of who invented those words in the first place. Because of our fear of the unknown, we have invented heaven and hell, mind and soul, etc. and these human inventions, which have no basis in reality, cannot be greater than man. To argue otherwise is to commit heresy, as I will quickly point you to God and man!
 The last point on the above deals with the equally confusing binaries: message /understanding and mind function/mental function. Message and understanding are clear and ease to grab, but allocating them to different sphere in human-created mind and mental states is ridiculous. Is mind-message responsible for mind-function? Is mental-message responsible for mental-function?

What I see here is that we fail to understand the process through which human brain processes and stores information. Those finer thoughts that we ascribe to ‘mind’ and ‘mental’ are all products of our brains. While we sleep, it keeps on working and storing away information for retrieval whenever the need arises. So, when we think what we say, write, or do is out of the body; the brain simply picked from its stores those ‘knowledge’ it stored away when we least know for our use. These are what we christened mind-messages and mental-messages. Those idiots that say there is no God missed this critical point on how the brain functions, which is synonymous to how the universe is ordered.

 The last two points in your comments are not as kind as those I have mentioned and analyzed above. Stop making us imbeciles, please. We cannot be daily assaulted on the roads, malls, churches and mosques and still won’t be allowed the necessity of cyber-space by preachers-without-borders.​ How can you think and say that we cannot understand the source of the sun and moon? Haven’t people landed on the moon? Remember that the Bible credited Joshua to have stopped the sun from setting when he was killing and maiming and raping Jews enemies! But today we know that it was a lie and that the earth, not the sun rotates. What else do you want to hear? Man has done so much with their God-given mental capacity and the sheer fact that you cannot reason out of the box is not enough to limit others’ capacity to transcend mundane pastor’s homilies. If the spirit transcends understanding and comprehension, then you who are led by it are doomed. But thank God, we, who are of this world, can comprehend God and His creatures. What better way to comprehend God than inventing airplanes, computers, laser surgery, etc. Other than empty words and sexed miracles; what has the spirit-filled, spirit-comprehending pastor/imam invented?

 Perhaps your last point is the most ridiculous. “All things have their source in the Spirit.” Like rape, murder, stealing, or what? I fear you don’t even know the meaning of what you just said. If all things have their sources in the spirit, then human beings should not be punished or praised for anything, whether bad or good. We should just praise or blame the spirit. Even if I don’t know anything, I know my illiterate great mother knew and taught us that nothing has its ‘source in the spirit’. She will tell us: ‘aigbo ifa, la now oke, ifa kan ko si ni para’ and also ‘oni iya, ni yo je gbogbo e’. God bless her soul! She knew that it is the delusion that religion impose on us and our mentality. It is the simplest dungeon that humanity is cast; only a few will get out of it in their life-time.

Religious Hypocrisy in Contemporary Nigeria

Facebook Interventions and Comments

"What does it mean when Christians say that certain matters are spiritually discerned? In my thinking, the spirit does not have a brain and all matters of comprehension and exposition must of necessity be accessed via the brain. Also, "understanding" is a mental function. How then does one spiritually discern a matter and why do some people like to insist that only the "spiritual mind" can understand some doctrinal issues? Can somebody please explain this to me?" Rolu Adebola, 27th November 2011.

"If Jesus were alive today, he'd be more comfortable among beer drinkers than with religious pple. In his days, he was more comfortable among wine drinkers than with religious ppl. I've found beer drinkers to be far more reliable than religious pple. And what "unbelievers" will do for u for free, the church won't & will still charge you." Rolu Adebola, 26th November 2011.

Dear Rolu, I don’t know anyone who can explain it without as much as preaching as Bayo Gbadehan did above. And, for me, that is where the problem is. The writers of the Bible loaded the book with so many caveats that, even crooks, can find good use for it. Nothing in the Bible, and therefore in Christianity, is logical. To be a Christian, you have to be gullible and unthinking. It is only in Christianity that 'spirits' have 'minds'; 'understands', and those other crabs. In these last ten years, I noticed that, except in Africa, people are realigning with rationality and critical thinking rather than with spirituality. For me the result is that developments, even on spiritual things, have tilted to the rational side than to the spiritual side. I remember that Nigerian pastors celebrated, some years back, the fact that only 10% of Africans were Christians early in the 20th Century and by the 21st Century, only 10% are non-Christians. I shudder to think about this, as it shows how lost to reality these people are. For me, only 10% are still Christians, the rest are simply church-goers and bench-warmers and pretenders. They are the crooks that are giving the religion a bad name today. To the issue you raised, I think it is fraud to have a set of values that stop people from reasoning. Religion is aimed at doing just that: stop people from thinking so that they will be amenable to socio-economic and political control of the ruling class. If you trace the history of the world religions, they all aligned with the courts. From the Dark Ages till now, religions and the courts, do not be deceived by the separation of both during the Enlightenment, work in the services of each other. The church asks us to be obedient to the leaders, who are milking us dry, and that our rewards are in heaven where no 'roaches' and termites will touch them. Paradoxically, the court and the church laid up treasures for themselves here on earth. So, by asking us to allow the spirit to 'think' for us; by asking us to 'be spirit-filled' and 'spirit-led'; the church/holy books, are making us amenable to state control; preparing us for the kill! The sheer number of congregants in churches and mosques today shows how readily Nigerians are in obeying pastors and imams than even the state. And the schools, by this I mean any educational system, is aimed at achieving a balance between 'what is Caesar’s' and 'what is God's' in you. The less rational we are, the more we pander to the churches and mosques and the state suffers. So, the aim of the educational system is to work out a harmonious balance. The more rational you are, the further you go away from the churches and mosques. To rein you in; religions label you as 'unbeliever', 'omo-esu', etc. and through blackmail, the churches and mosques plants, right in your house/heart, a monster that keep dangling before you a 'paradise' that you will miss, if you continue being rational, which they termed 'in your evil ways'. My father and wife have kept faith in ensuring that they call my attention to how much the 'devil' has achieved in steering me away from 'God'. Your monster may be your father, son, daughter, or wife. The greatest of the monster, I tell you, is not your father, wife, son, daughter or the society, but the uncritical surrender of your will to self-reflect (introspection). Look at it this way, Bayo and one or two other friends of yours have asked you to 'give' yourself to God for direction. But the embodiment(s) of God that you readily see around are the Bible/Quran and the Pastors/Imams. As a Classicist, you know that 'Jerry Boy' Oyakhilome and 'wordsmith' Okotie are clowns that bamboozle people with Latin words, some of which are not just tangentially different from what they had in mind, but also carry different meanings from the pastors' intention; and you wonder if this is 'God' playing the fool with you. Same as me when, as a lecturer in RUN, I saw Kenny Martins everyday in company of Pastor Adeboye at the same time the EFCC/Federal Government declared him wanted for financial impropriety. Just as many of us felt repulsed at Rev. King burning congregants and T.B. Joshua sexing up miracles, etc. etc. in the name of Jesus Christ; so I felt repulsed at the church (Pastor Adeboye) palling with Kenny Martins, Cecilia Ibru and Erastus Akingbola. You see through all these and many more and declared them, at first, in your heart, as emptiness with no compare. If you say it out (if you decided to be yourself), someone turns up the corner and tell (challenge, preach, etc.) you that you are wrong and that (at the very height of it all), you should make Jesus/God/Allah/heaven your focus. If you surrender your will and see it through their lens, then you trade your earlier bad name-tag for a new one - a born again! If you refuse to surrender your will, then you should go for anointing, deliverance, etc. As I am writing this piece, temperature on the street is -1 and I have revved up my room temperature to +20; this is my reality, which no pastor or imam and no monster can change. Rolu; that is my reality and religion!
Oyeniyi, Bukola Adeyemi, 28th November 2011

COMMENT
I can understand how you feel, Mr. Yemi, but I must tell you that you cannot kick out the God Factor from our existence. You see, a lot of beasts have hijacked the temple, still I make bold to say that there are still those who constitute a "remnant". They are just not so obvious because like "the 7000 in Elijah's day who had not yet bowed to Baal or kissed him", they seem so anonymous to the point of even being invisible or, worse, non-existent. I used to think like you too, but I know better now. It's easy to forget and overlook, but there is a judgment. And it will INESCAPABLY come! Right in our lifetimes and not in some big blue yonder, in the great by-and-by. Although that also has it's own thing to do with too. As for Nigeria, Nigerians and the Nigerian situation, consider the fact that all Nigerians have been brought up, time immemorial, in a culture of hypocrisy and so the "Pastors" know just what to tell these gullible people ion order to get the worst or best out of them for their own greedy gains. But hear the words of Thomas Jefferson: "Disobedience to Tyranny is Obedience to God!" You cannot deny that what we have here in Nigeria today is nothing but first class tyranny. And this is what I mean about people misinterpreting the Bible deliberately for selfish ends: Yes, the Bible talks about Government being God's idea, and rightly so. And the Government exists solely not to take care of the p[eople but to lay a proper foundation whereby the people can now take care of themselves as MATRURE, RESPONSIBLE and FREE people, anywhere in the world, should be able to do. Now this is the important issue: when government stops doing what it was supposed to originally do and neglects its' "raison d'etre", then it becomes the GOD-GIVEN right of the people who know their rights and their God to stand up and abolish and overthrow that government for it has become an oppressive tool not just of human oppressors but ultimately of the devil himself. If you argue with me about this, then just take a critical hard look at Nigeria, Nigerians nad the Nigerian situation. And by the way, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, George Washington and even those who influenced them from years earlier such as John Locke and Thomas Hobbes were ALL TRUE Christian believers. The truth is that, simply, in Nigeria, we practice AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY which is nothing, for the most part, but a form of STYLIZED WITCHCRAFT. Take a hint, friends, most Nigerians, especially Christians, are bewitched by the razzmatazz of their Churches and Pastors and all the attendant hoopla. I rest my case, friends.
Oluseyi Imah, 28th November 2011.

Makerere University successfully tests electric car! Why Nigeria Cannot Emulate Makerere University!

Makerere University Successfully Tests Electric Car! Why Nigeria Cannot Emulate Makerere University!

I am impressed by Makerere's feat! I was just asking myself if this can happen in Nigeria. As a university teacher, I can say without mincing words that for this to happen in Nigeria, we will have to move to another planet. Nigerian lecturers are too concerned with riding jeep and using blackberry and I-Phone 4 than any life-changing research! We have the worst and most dysfunctional education system in the world. Some years ago, under Professor Segun Oke, at Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso; one Muda achieved similar feat in Computer programming. Lautech celebrated him and he finally landed at Microsoft. Till date, Lautech cannot reproduce such feat simply because, Muda was a self-made student and not institution-made. University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, etc. have not recorded anything of Muda's caliber in the last 20 years and will not; i beg to be challenged, in the next 20 years. I am not a pessimist, but as an insider that daily witness and marvel at the madness going on in our university, I know that innovative research is far from us.

Let me illustrate this with a personal experience, Mope, as an undergraduate at the Redeemer's University, submitted a topic that bordered on a community in Yorubaland where two kings, one male and the other female, ruled simultaneously, as her B.A. History and International Relations Long-Essay. For me, it was one giant step, as it was not the general run of things that we see in the university system. Sadly, our professor saw a totally different thing. He openly canvassed that she and her fellow graduating students should go to the various libraries across Nigerian universities to look for already done projects to see what they can adapt. Mope's insistence almost cost her her degree. In the public university, the case is perhaps worse. Students of Olabisi Onabanjo University daily troop to UI to 'use the library', where they copied out entire theses and resubmited same under their names to their university for graduation. To another example, at Joseph Ayo Babalola University, only the poor student would fail. The system is that if a student fails a course or if he or she knew he would not perform well in an exams, all such student needs to do is to stay away from the exams and re-enroll for it in Summer Class, where no teaching was done for the entire one-month period, for 15, 000 naira per course. The least mark she or he can get at summer class is 40 or 50. Public universities in Nigeria are littered with teachers and administrators who are just marking time. Only a handful should be there. In the private school, the case is pathetic. In better climes, just a few of them should operate. A charade called university education in Nigeria cannot achieve such feat as Makerere just did. While those in the sciences will keep complaining of 'poorly-equipped laboratories' and their counterparts in engineering, who could not assemble a mere solar panel, despite that the rudimentary knowledge to do so is freely available on YouTube, would bore you with litany of why 'this and that won’t work'.

In the Humanities/Arts, the usual noise remains 'poorly-equipped libraries'. Yet, look around the university campuses and the number of exotic cars, especially SUVs, that you would see will shock you. Permit me to mention just two names, Professors Ayodele Olukoju of University of Lagos and Olawale Albert of University of Ibadan, are perhaps the few ones doing any meaningful researches in South West Nigeria today. Unfortunately, Prof. Olukoju has dumped University of Lagos for Caleb University as Vice-Chancellor, which is still part of the problem. Prof. Olukoju is perhaps one Nigerian professor that stayed at home and he is 'dusting' those hyper-hubris-driven American-based Nigerian professors, who had all the resources of this world to even be in the moon. Same goes for Prof. Isaac Albert. Others are almost everywhere taking adjunct positions, sometimes, in five universities at a time. How would they have time to read, let alone do researches and pioneer innovative research? In most Nigerian universities today, professors specialize in pushing away talents through frivolous excuses.

A friend who completed his PhD in University of Ibadan recently shocked me when he said "the external examiner from Unilorin was a bad man; he almost denied me the degree". When I probed further, what the professor from Ilorin queried was how a doctoral thesis on aberrant behaviours in Lagos could be done without any field work! For me, the fault is neither in the student nor the external examiner. It is with the professor/internal examiner in UI who, for me, is no better than a stalk illiterate. A young man, indeed, a very dear 'kid' friend of mine, studied Computer Science at Olabisi Onabanjo University. This young man cannot format a hard disk. He cannot load an Operating System on a computer. Anytime his computer has problem, not minding how minor this may be, it is either mine to fix it or a roadside 'engineer' who has no certificate of any sort!

Are these the people who are going to achieve the Makerere’s feat? Let’s call a spade a spade, Nigeria is a bad dream! The earlier we accept that, the better! A friend of mine, Obby Nelly 'Segun single handedly acculturated bacterial in an improvised biogas digester and power an entire four-bedroom flat with poultry waste! He is a secondary school teacher, not a university professor! Prof. Segun Oke, earlier mentioned, was the brain behind the cassava revolution that Obasanjo paraded before Nigerians for 8 years! He also has done jell-fuel with Cassava waste! Both cannot take out their invention beyond their homes because power generation is on the Exclusive List of the Nigerian constitution! So, cases of individuals who are doing well abound, but Nigerian universities cannot achieve Makerere's feat even if you empty World Bank for their use. Their priorities are different! They are not cerebral enough to know that SUVs and palatial homes, which they are financing with resources that they ought to vote on building libraries and sponsor projects, are all material things that would perish in one day. They are not cerebral enough to know that ideas, no matter how small, would live forever.

To my last example, Prof. J.F. Ade-Ajayi: he wrote more books and essays while in retirement than while he was in service. He built a library that could challenge University of Ibadan's Kenneth Dike Library anytime. How many such professors do we have in the system and what are their priorities? African Studies Center in Leiden, the Netherlands would not give as much as a paper to Nigerian professors because many have 'duped' them. Many other organizations have reported similar development. Please, do not see these examples as isolated cases, in fact, honest Nigerian university students and lecturers would tell you similar stories and, for me, these stories explain why Nigerian universities cannot rival Makerere. Currently, they are all madly rushing to put everything on the internet, even Joseph Ayo Babalola University that charges staff 18,000 and students 30,000 naira per annum for non-existing internet services, simply to curry 'better' university ranking! It is just stupid!

http://www.newvision.co.ug/news/18833-Makerere-University-successfully-tests-electric-car.html

Blatter, just a handshake is not enough!

Blatter, just a handshake is not enough!

It is stupid to think that Blatter and FIFA were leading any campaign against racism. For clarity, Blatter, the President of FIFA, has demonstrated the capacity to be both a gentleman and a buffoon, both a sexist and a racist, long before now. How he kept coming back as head of FIFA can be gleaned from the recent corruption charge. For the records, Blatter made the following sexist comments about Women football and got away with it, perhaps after bribing out those who ought to call him to order.

 "Let the women play in more feminine clothes like they do in volleyball. They could, for example, have tighter shorts. Female players are pretty, if you excuse me for saying so, and they already have some different rules to men - such as playing with a lighter ball. That decision was taken to create a more female aesthetic, so why not do it in fashion?"

The above, said in 2004, about a game that many have spend nights and years and resources to develop is laughable, even if uttered by a toddler. But coming from the same man who is head of FIFA, world football governing body, is, to say the least, madness-in-disguise. From the wordings of the statement, to its very content, it is incontestable that Berlusconi and Blatter may after all be friends in casting aspersions on females, sex, and similar stuffs.  How he managed to get away, especially from the barbs and arrows of feminists scholars, is still a wonder.

On slavery, he was decidedly unbridled.  He not only likened Christiano Ronaldo, then World Footballer, to a slave, but also trivialised the institution of slavery, a sin perpetrated by the West against Africans and people of African descent; a sin that is the core of what Patrice Evra, Aton Ferdinand, Daniel Sturidge and many others have had to endure in 21^st century Great Britain.  Listen to Blatter:

"I'm always in favour of protecting the player and if the player, (he) wants to leave, let him leave. I think in football there's too much modern slavery in transferring players or buying players here and there, and putting them somewhere."

English FA’s indictment of Luis Suares as a racist and Blatter’s corruption indictment could not draw any useful comment from Blatter than that:

“Players who are racially insulted during matches should accept it as part of on-field provocation and shake hands with their opponent at the end of the game and move on!”

What an insult!

Rio Ferdinand, whose brother was allegedly racially assaulted by John Terry of Chelsea FC and Captain of English National team, was perhaps too gentlemanly with Blatter when he wrote to the old man:

"I feel stupid for thinking that football was taking a leading role against racism, just for clarity if a player abuses a referee, does a shake of the hand after the game wipe the slate clean? If fans shout racist chants but shake our hands is that ok?"

One thing is clear, Blatter’s cup is full. His latest turn around statement that:

"My comments have been misunderstood. What I wanted to express is that, as football players, during a match, you have 'battles' with your opponents, and sometimes things are done which are wrong. But, normally, at the end of the match, you apologise to your opponent if you had a confrontation during the match, you shake hands, and when the game is over, it is over. Anyone who has played a football match, or a match in any sport, knows that this is the case."

Racism, which Blatter (and FIFA under Blatter) claimed to be fighting, should be a matter of serious concern than to be subject of gutter talk. He wanted to say! But he said just a handshake is enough! Football is a game of passion, so also other games. Racism speaks to inner values of the black people. Racism and Blatter’s comment speaks to our history, as peoples and as a continent. Let the world remembers: we were killed, maimed and enslaved on our own land; uprooted from our continent and dehumanized aboard European slavers’ ship and brought across the Atlantic to Europe and the New World. We bore the pains, the death, and the infamies with unequal dignity up to these days. With our blood and our toil; we built not just plantations, but also nations. We built your empires, your kingdoms, your cities, your homes. You fill your banks with money, blood money!

Uprooted, lonely, and dehumanized; we have no home, no nation and no identity! When machine’s labour surpassed our strength, you declared freedom for the slaves and pronounced the world a common heritage for all. However, at every turn, you reminded us our history, a sin committed by your fathers on our common humanity and for which you should be ashamed!

Just a handshake, Blatter, just a handshake to wipe aside 400 years of slavery! Just a handshake to wipe away the dead, the pain of more than 20 million souls! Blatter, just a handshake is not enough!

Rise, black people and people of African descent!  Rise!!