LIVING IN THE POWER OF THE CRUCIFIED LORD 2

LIVING IN THE POWER OF THE CRUCIFIED LORD 2

There are many people who never placed a demand on life, not even a demand for meaning and purpose. As a result, life never offered them anything. Such is the identity of cowards who go about causing confusion and polluting the air of existence everywhere. In the book of Job 30 vs. 8, these people are referred to as “a worthless bunch of nameless nobodies”. There are also many others whom life bowed to their demands but they abused the boundless opportunities which life has offered either because of greed or because of pride.

Jews demand miracles and the Greeks look for Wisdom. Pentecostals demand miracles to fan the flame of their life that is near to extinction because of the activities of hoodlums on the corridors of power. Nobody should condemn them but they should be pitied. Of course, if you see the kind of crowd that gather in every miracle center and the kind of manipulation they suffer in the hands of money making pastors, you pity them. The way they pray and bind devil, and conduct fasting and vigils, so long as miracles can come is alarming. And so long as miracle is flowing, you see good Christians who keep the law and commandments, but immediately the miracle is all over, and the fun has diminished, you now have the opportunity to see whom the person are: Christians ?

On their own part, Greeks look for wisdom – those who claim to have been spoken to directly from the oracle of wisdom They bring out the Torah of Moses and search the nooks and crannies of the Bible to see where the place of the Pope is in the Bible; how the rosary and due honour to the Mother of God is a calculated impulse of idolatry, how the Eucharist is an abomination, and why Catholic Priests should marry. They hastily dig into history to credit their assumptions.

The main thrust of Ministry in the Catholic Church is not on the god of miracles; even though we know and appreciate the fact that God is a God of miracles; and the greatest miracles in the history of Christendom had happened in the Catholic Church.

The main thrust of ministry in the Church is not about intelligence and human wisdom even though we know and appreciate the fact that God gives the gift of intelligence and wisdom to people. And of course, the most learned, most intelligent and the wisest of men have been products of Catholic Civilizations – poetry, architecture, medicine-science, philosophy, theology, etc. The most powerful kingdom in the world is the Vatican – a sovereign state occupying a space of not up to 1000 acres of land. That is intelligence! That’s wisdom! Yet this is not the thrust of the ministry in the Church.

The Church of God- the Catholic Church preaches a crucified Christ - an obstacle to the Jews and Pentecostals who because of their needful condition is understandaly, in need of a miraculous messiah. But it is important to note the fact that Jesus opted out of a bread and butter kingship. On one occasion when they wanted to force him to wear the kingly crown, he escaped from their midst. In John. 6., He disappointed the miracle hunters by offering his body and blood as the real food and damned the consequences. They all went away. I know many people will go away before this Mass ends, except for true disciples who have nowhere to go than to remain in Christ. When the young rich man came to him in his charm and flamboyancy, and posited the most difficult question ever asked in the Bible: which is the greatest commandment? And as Jesus reached out beyond human intelligence and wisdom that are rendered null and void in the face of the most difficult questions of life to the bottomless ocean of divine intelligence, and uttered the word “Love,” the learned men and ladies of the law thought it foolish to have reduced the whole of Torah to a term that has never been used and applied by the most ancient and most contemporary legal luminaries. Until Jesus’ own time, the noun form of the verb “to love” had never been found in the book of Law or given a reserved place in the Law Literature. When the young rich man was taking by the hand to thread the length and breath of human wisdom, and was eventually admitted into the cloud of divine foolishness, he left disappointed. He expected to be given a price and a promotion, but was disappointed at the loving invitation of Jesus unto discipleship; something that he considered as madness and insult.

I am not unaware that there are people who will be disappointed in me before this Mass ends. They will consider it madness and insult to do or say what I am doing today or what I am saying. After the young man had left, Jesus said: Children, how hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God. In other words: the rich also cry !

We preach a crucified Jesus - a Eucharistic Jesus who has paid the price of our sins, the price of our oil, the price of our democracy, the price of our freedom, the price of our liberation and the price of our life.

We preach a Christ who is the power and the wisdom of God. Of course, God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.

Today, in Nigeria, in many individual lives, in many marriages, in many companies, shops and organizations, people do what they like, and think that the law and commandments of God are a fool’s testimony; they thwart the laws of the land, make a mockery of norms and established principles of order so as to suit their selfish and evil purposes and think that God is foolish. They continue everyday on the path of iniquity and terror and murder and robbery and think that God cannot act; that God has no strength to do anything. I tell you Gal 6:7 says: Do not be deceived, God is not mocked whatever a man sows that he shall reap. If you sow destruction, you reap … God’s foolishness is stronger than the occult think than in Benin, and his weakness is stronger than EFCC, ICPC, and the assassin’s bombs put together. God is stronger than the president and commander-in-chief of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. God is stronger than you. God is stronger than me.

He is the perfect author of Abacha’s destiny and the astute perfecter of Abiola’s fate. He alone has real facts and values of existence and He alone drives creation through history to its final end. No one does this, and no one can do this. On the strength of this, it is said that vanity upon vanity, all is vanity. Nothing is permanent expect God. Yet the world is not total passivity. In which case, I don’t want to absolutize relativity, neither do I want to under- evaluate permanence. Permanence and change are two mutually inclusive concepts for the elucidation and regulation of the human reality. None of these concepts holds any claim to meaning except in its relationship with the absolute value that has fully crystallized into concreteness – Jesus Christ.

A value is a value only in so far as it retains in its generality, a relevance in the appreciation of reality; or in part, in its capacity as a constituent ingredient of the driving force of history; or in a very minute way, as a catalyst in the evolutionary process. The above is the definition of a positive value. A negative value would on the other hand constitute a watchdog or a stubborn obstacle (e.g. Law) against mediocrity, diversion, perversion and the pretensions of history and evolution on course, and as well trace the factors of their conatus, development and execution as an issue for questioning and possible extinction. To appreciate this assertion better, permit me to have recourse to a line in the book; English Verse which reads…..” If hope means illusion, then fears may be lairs…..”

Thus, while permanent is only but a stubborn issue of constitutive evolutionary development and an inescapable and ineligible historical antecedent, relativity is an evaluated concern for variance and purpose which struggles to maintain its grip on reality until history is unpacked for a particular epoch, and until the evolutionary process enters a new phase of development, thus disposing it (relativity) to re-evaluation and confirmation. And so, even though permanence (understood only in its relation to absolute value) is above and beyond time, yet it is only within time that permanence is discovered and only in it does it wear tangibility. On the other hand, even though relativity is born within time and cannot move outside or beyond time, but is sustained by history, its meaning and purpose lies in the part it plays in the authentic unveiling and unfolding of permanence, that is, in its absolute willingness to be at the service of permanence as the all-important guest in the arena of temporality.

Now, tradition, in its most technical sense, is the unbiased appreciation in time, of the interactive actions of permanence and relativity as inclusive factors of elucidation of reality, each in its own right and in its capacity as a “given“ in the excavation and sustainability of values, positive or negative. In a way, tradition, informed and acting on the strong suggestions and testimonies of this overall important interactive action of permanence and relativity imagines and scientifically creates reality into concreteness, into tangibility, into a “given”. Tradition must perform this function if life and creation must find a meaning and a purpose. In a way therefore, tradition creates the true picture and thus bring to closer proximity the size, colour and contours of the Absolute value. This is not wrong but rather a necessary function even it can be dangerous when it is substituted for the Absolute itself which can never be entirely grasped or created but only encountered. Worst still it be manipulated to serve the self. Indeed when tradition goes beyond this function of scientific creation for the purpose of encounter and begins to arrogate the totality of reality unto itself, tradition by this very act has consciously or unconsciously, implicitly and explicitly, already been extinguished because if the Absolute has fully and perfectly been made tangible, tradition ceases to exist. Paul says now we see through the mirror but on that day, we shall see face to face.

In the person of Jesus Christ, the Absolute was wholly unveiled and made concrete, yet the Absolute remains in the words of Karl Rahner, not the “Undiscovered Unknown” (that is, something no one has ever seen or touched or experienced or perceived, and whose existence, if at all it does exist, rests only on a grossly devastating probability), but the “Discovered Unknown” (that is, something we have discovered, seen and, possibly touched, even though one cannot exhaustively decode and digest completely everything about it). In this regard, suffice it to mention here that the Eucharist is the most radical and final form God will take in his permanent or perpetual interaction with the pilgrim humanity. He is fully present, yet he has gone back to the Father. The next timehe comes, he is going to come as The King.

By the interactive actions of permanence (the Logos) and change (the foetal developmental stages of events and meanings), the Absolute finds its radical and most decisive manifestation and total appreciation in the person of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Nothing or nobody else has ever met this ideal in history. And every authentic search for meaning and for the truth even if started or expressed tangentially elsewhere, begins and ends with him. Thus acting on these interactive actions of permanence and change, tradition in the event of the Church and her Sacred Institutions and Sacraments creates and sustains the original manifest identity of the Absolute. That is to say that, even though we have had a perfect picture of the Absolute Reality as evidenced in the person of Jesus Christ, yet this does not mean we have completely known and fully understood or grasped everything about Him. Tradition, having Peter as its guide and guard, must therefore intensify its work of unveiling. Since the Absolute is still very much around though hidden behind the Eucharist and since this Eucharist can be found in every nook and cranny of the globe, this work has been made easier because His presence which monumentally confronts every member of the globe in the Eucharist is always and everyday at work in our lives, our activities and our world – a beautiful world. And since His presence is Grace, then indeed, at no other time in history has grace been so manifestedly abundant than now. In the words of that great theologian Karl Rahner, Grace is ubiquitous. And the Eucharist, being an embarrassing but a necessary child of Love is not only the power of divine love tangibly and experientially at work in lives, our world and in history, but also a call an invitation to mission – the mission to love. Anywhere, anytime, anyhow, Jesus has no other mission or embassy except if it is at the service of Divine Love. This is so because, while in Karl Rahner’s correct estimation, Jesus Christ is the most radical, decisive and final form God, the Absolute Mystery can assume when he decides to venture into the human abode sorely for the sake of man, the Eucharist in my personal estimation is the most radical, decisive and final form Jesus Christ can assume when testified to by the Holy Spirit in the World. It is very interesting to find out that, even in its Christological bent, the Eucharist has a very rich Pneumatological background. It is the work of the Holy Spirit accomplished through the beautiful hands of the Priest who is alive in every catholic priest. Every day, this priest even though weak, imperfect, threatened by powers of darkness, weary, powerless like Peter, doubtful and unsure of the powers like Thomas, ever induced to great ambition like the twins, imprisoned, cajoled, mocked and guilty even to the point of being referred to as Satan and rebuked by no other than the Master himself but yet constantly admonished to repent like Judas – this priest works the greatest of miracles. He makes God Present and lets him feed those who believe. As long as he does this in love and repentance, and does not do it except in love, then he is perfect. Despite the lamentable punctuations that might be littered on its path, no one can accuse love. The Holy Spirit is Love. And Love is God.

Reality makes meaning out of unity and variance; out of permanence and change; mundane and sacred; material and spiritual; matter and form. Out of the unity of opposites and the dynamism of tradition, reality unfolds. There is a thin thread of unity piercing through all facets of existence, each of the facets being pierced in accordance with and in relation to the center of and sensitivity to value and purpose which it holds, consciously and unconsciously, implicitly or explicitly. An evaluation of the values and purpose of any of the facets is not the exclusive prerogative of one man. It is the inclusive function of the society, and tradition. However any society or tradition that shows aversion for value and, would even shortchange them, given an opportunity is to be considered a perverted one. A successful evaluation is dependent on the society’s openness to change and progress.

Change is only but the different shades of clothes which relativity puts on reality as a complement to permanence’s of involvement in and with time, in their (permanence and change) collaborative pursuance of values of enhancement. Change is not illusive, not even accidental but is essential for reality’s evolution and also for functional development. Change and permanence are complementary factors of reality. African leaders, both political and religious leaders must begin to appreciate the interactive action of permanence and change, otherwise there is no progress and no development, and in the absence of this, laws, constitutions, hierarchy and tradition loose their force and significance, and whittle away at the altars of irrelevance, and are swept away by the force of change as a condition for a return to originality and for continuity.

When Jesus Christ, the Absolute Maker and the only Absolute power, lawmaker and prophet took the permanent cords of reality and transformed them into a force of change, the center of gravity of tradition changed in the Temple- everybody scampered for safety. He did not come with any weapon in his hand but stood on the pulpit of Truth and Power to counteract the menacing impacts of occultism and corruption in the Temple of Law. Obasanjo does not need EFCC and Third Term to fight corruption and bring development. What he needs is to wear the shoes of the gospel of honesty and stand on the pulpit of freedom. Unfortunately, the shoes in his legs are an ugly “I swear to God” and the pulpit he is standing on is founded on occultism and intimidation. Such a man achieves nothing. He offers nothing. He deserves nothing.

If Obasanjo maintains sealed lips over Third-Term and refuses to rebuke the sponsors of the Third Term, then he is an ugly and poor advertisement of whatever he professes and represents.

If obasanjo does not hand Mantu and his colleagues over to EFCC, then the anti-corruption war is the new cloak the Holocaust wears in modern Nigeria – He must be forced to apologize to Wabara and Osuji, and re-instate Alameghesia.

I heard that Sr. Dr. Peter Odili has banned and ordered the arrest of his people who are campaigning for him for presidency. If that is true, he should resign from the Government House of RiversState because that office belongs to the people of RiversState.

On the part of our people and the church, it is important to understand that there is no need to continue to force support on a man or women who says he/she does not need your support, even if this is said secretly or openly, consciously or unconsciously, implicitly or explicitly. Heaven helps those who help themselves. When somebody does not need God for support, then the church must not give him the support. For Christian support and solidarity is of God. It can never be bought. Moreover, it was late Momoh Vatsa who said that when people start insulting themselves, many will be a rejoinder.

History is watching the unfolding drama in Nigeria and in the life of Nigerian. And what is history? History is the actions of creation, individually or collectively, as they respond to the call of God for salvation. In history, as an event, reality as the foundation of every possibility and actuality unveils itself. History is therefore the continuum of reality as an existential subject of responsibility. It is the totality of the diverse activities found in creation but forced into a whole in that mystical event of the human person.

Here is raised the issue of the interconnectivity of beings, of responsibility and of knowledge as well as the incursive character of events (one action conditions another). So even though there is a determined plan of action, freedom can alter it or sustain it. However, even though there is an already determined line of action which of course is a strong character of reality otherwise it will not wear the attribute of permanence, freedom can alter or sustain it either for good or for bad. In other words, freedom can serve as a factor of enhancement in reality’s own evolution or as an obstacle to this. Freedom is therefore a catalytic substance of a new Action in an already pre-determined action. The school may be said to have to vacate on 12 Dec. but the staff may say no! Because they have their freedom. Their “ no” may be informed by a residue of chronic cynicism against correlation and continuity or by a clinical disposition of repositioning. In the former a veil has be sown into a tent behind which incongruent actions are hatched and executed against a predetermined end. This is all the more unfortunate if this end is divinely ordained. In the later, additional bricks are introduced into the foundations of originality. Two of them are therefore catalytic. The two sides have the capacity to be turned into a debate –And such is the debate of life which may have exothermic character or an endothermic one.

When the heat is too much to the point of suffocation, we have a cold-war situation. When the heat turns into a flame, there is the condition of war in which everything is exposed to the flames. In this case, freedom can be exercised in 3 ways; affirmation, confirmation and negation.

· Affirmation is the positive support given for the incubation and execution of action.

· Confirmation is the acceptance of an existing action for progressive development and eventual execution.

· Negation is the rejection of action either at its conatus or development or execution. Here, we have freedom operating as partial or total negation.

Man is defined by freedom and the exercise of that freedom in the ongoing debate of life. Whether such a debate is endothermic or exothermic in character is secondary. What is important is man’s courage to exercise his freedom and thus, by such exercise, can direct the course of history, positively or negatively.

The current debate about 3^rd term is not about politics only. It is also and more importantly about life. Of a greater significance is that it is about the life of Nigeria and Nigerians which have been subjected to too much tinkering by achronically depraved political minds. Currently, the destiny of Nigerians is on the abattoir of a dangerous occult fraternity in Benin whose power and notoriety has grown because it has succeeded in demolishing parallel opposition structures in Abia , Okija and in the North, and has gone on to institute a debate on whether Nigerians should remain alive or not, whether the destiny of Nigerians should not be uprooted finally from its original source to service the murderous machinery of an occult fraternity in the Benin kingdom. And so , Istand here to tell you authoritatively that the ongoing debate about third- term is not about politics only. It is about your life and destiny. It is about life and destiny of the millions of human beings scattered over the geographical location called Nigeria.

Nobody can threaten me out of the debate of my life with the charge of partisan politics, corruption, or abuse of pulpit. My people we must rise up and fight for freedom with the only weapon of warfare in our hands. Rom 5:16 says I have complete confidence in the gospel; it is God’s power unto salvation, liberation, freedom. Very soon, the Story of Okija will only be a footnote to what is going to happen in Benin.

Today, we seem to have in our midst and in positions of authority, our own brothers and sisters who have sold their birthrights and betrayed the huge trust reposited on them. But the Bible says have nothing to do with unbelievers and in Ps36 he says do not envy a wicked man, his progress should not cost you your sleep. Like Esau they have sold their birthright and must suffer in perpetual slavery. A Jacob shall take their places in the hall of honour and power.

They have transgressed the commandments given through Moses so as to execute the destructive impulse of their selfish quest like Jews in the gospel today. And because they have made a caricature of the message of life and freedom; and because they have trifled with the laws of the land; and because they have made a mockery of our moral norms; and because they have subverted the established principles of order and discipline, they shall always be found fiddling the reigns of perpetual slavery. Any Rivers man who joins them is a curse upon the land and a saboteur of the highest grade. Any Igbo man who nods a head in support confirms his condemnation to perpetual slavery and anguish. Any Nigerian who joins them must face anti-corruption tribunal. Anyone who sponsors them should be the one to draw the attention of anti- terrorist action more Osama Bin Laden.

Those who have a question and a reservation against what I am doing, I refer you to the Gospel of today. It is the gospel of John 2:13-25. Jesus made a whip out of some cord. He drove those selling and buying, and the money changers and oil swindlers out of the temple. He did not give a damn about the commotion and protests it would cause in the CMO, CWO, Parish Council or Pastoral Council, or in the Canon Law or Nigeria Streets. After all, the Law was given through Moses- the great law maker and leader of the people of God. In the bible, it is said that there never was and never has been a lawmaker like him.

When prodigal humanity had grown +perverse against the commandments of God, mystical prophetism was instituted by God, using Elijah as an instrument. While the law was a guide to pilgrim man groping in the darkness of existence, mystical prophetism outlined and made concrete the eternal determinations of obedience or disobedience to the law of God. In the gospel reading of last Sunday, the great mother Church in her wisdom as sustained by the Holy Spirit, took us to the mount of transfiguration and unveiled the truth contained in the bible that in Jesus Christ of Nazareth, law and prophecy have found perfect correlation and fulfillment. And that obedience to the law and prophets, and not to godfathers, is the source of honour and power. Today, he demonstrates that eternal commitment to the law and to the prophets are the only effective instrument of order and discipline in the church and in the society. And that Occult Fraternities in the cloak of Pastoral Councils, or National Assembly is not the lawgiver nether does it have power over divinely established destinies. God is the sole maker and supreme caretaker of the store of providence. Do not fear he who can destroy the body only, but cannot touch the spirit. Rather fear he who can destroy the body and the spirit. EFCC can destroy the body not the spirit. The well known armed robber in late 1990s called Monday Osunbor (aka Anini) who has reincarnated, can only destroy the body not the spirit. Occult vultures can only destroy the body not the spirit.

When Banangida annulled June 12 and disposed Abiola to his untimely grave, he thought he had killed the spirit of democracy. Today the body of Abiola is no more, yet the spirit of democracy lives on. Abacha hanged Saro Wiwa and thought he had silenced the spirit of liberty. Today the spirit of Liberty l;ives on; the spirit for self determination lives on. Recently, Obasanjo arrested Asari Dokubo and Raph Uwazuruike and thought that by that he will quench the flames of rvolution that have started to sweep across the land. Poor Obasanjo! How mistaken he is. It is said that those who make peaceful changes impossible make violent change inevitable.

Addressing the American people after he was sworn into second term on Jan 20,2005, President Bush said :

Ø Across the generations we have proclaimed the imperative of self-government, because no one is fit to be a master and no one deserves to be a slave.

Ø The great objective of ending tyranny is the concentrated work of generations. The difficulty of the task is no excuse for avoiding it.

Ø We will persistently clarify the choice before every ruler and every nation: the moral choice between oppression, which is always wrong, and freedom, which is eternally right.

Ø The call of freedom comes to every mind and every soul. We do not accept the existence of permanent tyranny because we do not accept the possibility of permanent slavery. Liberty will come to those who love it.

Ø You have seen that life is fragile, and evil is real, and courage triumphs. Make the choice to serve in a cause larger than your wants, larger than yourself- and in your days you will add not just to the wealth of our country, but to its character.

Ø Liberty for all does not mean independence from one another. Our nation relies on men and women who look after a neighbor and surround the lost with love.

Discussing also the situation of terror at the AmericanNationalDefensUniversity on March 5,2005, President Bush said:

Ø When a dictatorship controls the political life of a country, responsible opposition cannot develop, and dissent is driven underground and toward the extreme. And to draw attention away from their social and economic failures, dictators place blame on other countries and other races, and stir the hatred that leads to violence. This status quo of despotism and anger cannot be ignored or appeased, kept in a box or bought off, because we have witnessed how the violence in that region can reach easily across borders and oceans.

Ø By now it should be clear that authoritarian rule is not the wave of the future: it is the last gasp of a discredited past. It should be clear that free nations escape stagnation, and grow stronger with time, because they encourage the creativity and enterprise of their people. It should be clear that economic progress requires political modernization, including honest representative government and the rule of law. And it should be clear that no society can advance with only half of its talent and energy- and that demands the full participation of women.

Ø Freedom has determined enemies, who show no mercy for the innocent, and no respect for the rules of warfare.

Ø Pervasive fear is the foundation of every dictatorial regime- the prop that holds up all power not based on consent. And when the regime of fear is broken and the people find their courage and find their voice, democracy is their goal, and tyrants, themselves, have reason to fear.

Ø We are confident that the desire for freedom, even when repressed for generations, is present in very human heart. And the desire can emerge with sudden power to change the course of history.

Ø Those who place their hope in freedom may be attacked and challenged, but they will not ultimately be disappointed, because freedom is the design of humanity and freedom is the direction of history.

Ø Before history is written in books, it is written in courage- the courage of honorable soldiers, the courage of oppressed peoples, and the courage of free nations in difficult tasks.

If only it is possible for me to swim to the creeks! I desire to have audience with those my brothers whose passion for the truth has driven them into the deserts and oceans. I desire to parley with Asari Dokubo in his struggle for freedom and self determination, for, even though we differ in method, we are strongly united in spirit. If only my name can be found worthy to be written in MASSOB’s register as an instructor on how the law of the land can be kept even as we pursue our goal for freedom.

. The point is that in the body and blood of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist, the great lawmaker lives; the sole maker and supreme caretaker of the store of destiny lives on. He is the eternal high priest in the order of Melchizedek of old- greater than Moses, and can never be compared to Mantu and his committee of the brood of vipers who have desecrated the temple of law. If President Obasanjo does not hand Mantu and his committee over to EFCC to ascertain how much each was bribed to effect the descretion of the temple of law, then Obasanjo’s anti-corruption war is the veil which the locust wears in modern times.

For the sake of the maintainance of the democratic atmosphere, sure answers to two murder puzzles have been hidden and those puzzles added as stanzas to New swatch’s age long chorus “Who killed Dele Giwa?” The new stanzas are: Who killed Bola Ige ?” and “Who killed Marshal Harry ?”

Out rightly, we have to advice the police to stop insulting Nigerians through the reports of the spurious investigations they put to our face. Bola Ige and Marshal Harry lived and were gruesomely murdered in the Nigerian soil and not in some sort of Alice’s Wonderland from where the police is importing their reports.

Before their death, Bola Ige showed what was considered to be “an undue enthusiasm” for a confederated Nigeria and stubbornly toyed with that idea, while Marshal Harry sang the repulsive chorus of resource control. In fact, Ige and Harry shared a similar fate and suffered chronically from related diseases. Ige’s disease could have been responded to by Harry’s own drugs. But for those who were supposed to care of them, the drugs were very costly for a whole nation to afford. Many Nigerians strongly believe that it is the suffocation from the lack of the air of a confederated Nigeria which he needed so badly in order to resuscitate the nation’s ailing ribs incarnating in his own very ribs as a true statesman, more than the bullets from the guns of the hired assassins that sent Bola Ige to his untimely grave. Also, it is the burden of the dangerous weapons for resource control which he carried and realistically wielded as well as his refusal to inhale the choking fumes of electoral brigandry which he perceived coming, more than the bullets from the guns of the so-called armed robbers demanding N20m from a man whose parlour was not a Bank Safe that sent Marshal Harry to his untimely grave. I cannot fool myself to think that the explanations given above will bury finally the question of the murder of Ige and Harry. Neither can the police’s gimmicks suffice. But these have helped us to buy time in order to service the deteriorating democratic levers. Perhaps, when the question re-suffices again, as it must, the police may have woken up from their doggish sleep and may even have to redefine the meaning and contents of a tear gas especially in its relation with Okadigbo.

Indeed, a lot has been sacrificed, and much endured for the seed of democracy to germinate and grow in our arid soil.The blood of innocent men and women has flowed enough to water the seeds of democracy and freedom in the Nigerian soil. What do we say of that great editor and patriot Dele Giwa; how do we mourn Kudirat Abiola & Saro Wiwa; how do we explain to Bola Ige that he who served in the temple of justice could not have a taste of justice; how do we remember Marshal Harry’ how do we pay for the bloody sweat of people like Gani, Adams Oshiomhole, Chris Anyanwu and Archbishop Okogie. It is no longer necessary to expose the god given and talented editors of our newspapers and magazines to risk or sacrifice our most intelligent minds at the altar of non-existent entity called Nigeria. Jesus has paid the price of Nigeria on the cross. Today, Jesus Christ takes up the Nigerian question: And that question is: Is there one Nigeria ? The great lawmaker and the supreme caretaker of the store of destiny directed this critical and urgent question to Obasanjo and to Mantu-led committee.

The second question is : Who are the Nigerians?

The earlier they give an answer, the better for them. Delay is dangerous. For, I can see Jesus making a whip out of some cords in the Temple of Justice. If they like they can destroy my body, and in three days, he that is in me will raise it up.

Our leaders must be made to accept the fact that change, is a necessary positive ingredient of development and continuity.

Continuity is a process of growth or development which admits only of facts that are well linked-up or connected in their inner self even though there may be a disproportion in shapes and sizes.

When higher facts emerge and present themselves as the missing link in the process, and actually prove to be so because of their sublime character, continuity or transition begins. Obasanjo is wrong in his definition of continuity. Change is a necessary moment in the programme of continuity. The reason for transition is found in its ability to build-up this force and sustain the original impulse. Change therefore is an isolated necessary moment in the programme of continuity. The condition for continuity is not in the irrational prolongation of the human actors or in the allegiance to old methods and formulas, but in the continuous discovery anew and evolution of the force of unity and the originality of purpose which is hidden behind the broad spectrum of facts.

Unity and functionality, not the actors and their methods, are the discerning factors of authenticity in the process of development. When unity ignores functionality, what takes place is the birth of a kind of monstrous dwarfism of the entire process of development. A good example of this is found in a system or a tradition which does not encourage growth and innovations but rests only on the impulse of its actors and their outdated methods. Nigerian leaders and others must allow themselves be confronted and educated by this proven fact of existence especially as this affects tradition, orthodoxy and hierarchy. On the other hand, it is also important to observe that when functionality ignores the stubborn fact of unity, there is an infection of the entire process of development with a cancerous growth that lacks meaning and purpose. In the final analysis, it is discovered that what seemed like a rapid development is only but a balloon filled with the suffocating air of illusion which stands at danger of being perforated when the system is forced under severe tension. At this point, there is a total collapse not only of meaning and purpose but also of the actors and their methods. A good example is the process of creation of wealth which occurred during the Babangida regime but which has brought this nation to a total collapse even as everything about Nigeria lacks meaning and purpose and is instead under the corrosive influence of corruption and threatened heavily with total disintegration into unproductive ethnic lumps of different sizes and shape. Can Africa withstand such shame after the experience of Sudan, Rwanda, Somalia, etc. The rapid progress which a society enjoys owing to advancements in science and technology without a correlation in other areas of life is equally faced with a danger of total collapse at the end of the day. Here there is always a hurried change of actors and methods depending on their capacity for function without a corresponding consideration of their capacity for unity. This is a problem that besieges pragmatic societies.

The undercurrent of such dichotomy between unity and functionality has been pinned down to interest which will always refuse, for obvious reasons e.g. fear of illumination and opposition, to submit itself to a critical evaluation, but on the contrary, elevate itself to a value – and, sometimes, usurp the position of absolute value. In this quest, every occasion or moment stands the danger of manipulation, or that the creative impulse is put at the disposal of selfishness. Selfishness is always unrelenting in its effort to ensure the dichotomy between unity and functionality and at the same time delights in the project of manipulation and the diversion of the creative impulse.

The problem being raised is not the obvious demand of self-preservation but the power of interest and the superficiality of unevaluated allegiance. Thus, we call all the Nigerian actors to order.

In a speech marking the declaration of the Second World War, Adolf Hitler, the German dictator and self- acclaimed Messiah said:

“I have studied Biology, and yet I have not found the position of the soul in the body. I have studied Geography to infinity, and yet I could not locate God in heaven……” With the first statement, Hitler murdered the inner voice of conscience and extinguished the light of reason from the hearts of his followers. From then on obedience to conscience was translated to mean the unquestionable satisfaction of the Fuhrer’s unbridled appetite for power and blood. With the latter, he destroyed the sense of value and responsibility. The Fuhrer was now the absolute value.

Hitler’s method was subtle. With the right hand, he painted an utopian picture of a miraculously powerful evolving German nation that was intelligently spreading her tentacles all over Europe and across the globe. With the left, under a beautifully veiled but pretentious concern for the common good, he initiated a systematic decimation of effective opposition. The two hands were latter discovered to be a two-prong fork dishing out the agenda of a global satanic fraternity upon a fragile humanity, targeting especially those whose standards and intimidating credentials posed a threat to the interests of the fraternity itself. It is unfortunate that nobody, including the Church and other virtuous or respectable men of the German populace could raise a voice in opposition to Satanic invasion of the human psyche either for fear that their own interests would be destroyed or for the fear of death. Paradoxically, till date, the German nation and all the willing and unwilling collaborators are still establishing their alibi during the Second World War. This is the price for keeping sealed lips in the face of evil.

If a Christian shows an undue and desperate desire for miracle, Satan will always tolerate such a person and latter adopt this same person as a destabilizing instrument against the community of faith. If a Christian expresses a desperate search for human wisdom and intelligence, the devil can tolerate such a person and eventually lavish the person with the gift of intelligence that has a built-in contradiction in itself- an innocent display of arrogance and paralyzing ignorance, or a flamboyant advertisement of polluting intellectualism.

But when a Christian is able to go beyond these to discover the cross of Calvary, and wholly embraces this, he becomes a terror to the devil himself and all his cohorts, including occult fraternities. When Satan discovers a Christian who is not afraid to go to crucifixion, Satan himself is swept away.

The gospel of today is a conscious attempt to introduce all to the path of the cross. This is Jesus’ own way of life. For, radically given to his eternal commitment to freedom and liberation, Jesus dismissed every fact of fear as a satanic strategy for distraction. Soaked in the power of the consciousness of God’s abiding and eternal presence, He resolutely took the way to Jerusalem. Lost in the zeal for the work of the Father, he cleansed the temple for God’s habitation. Determined to do the will of the Father at whatever cost, he prayed that the Father’s will be done. Demonstrating his unshakable love for the world and his own, he gave his flesh and blood as a memorial offering in the Eucharistic banquet. Sympathizing with the human situation, he gave up his own life. Proving the power he possessed to save, he entered the grave for battle. Of course, chapter fifty-two of Isaiah says “my servant shall himself succeed in his mission”. Jesus was indeed resolute in doing the Father’s will. Thus when you have an incontestable revelation (cf. Amos 3:6) which builds up a vision (Proverbs 18:31 b) so as to send you out on a mission (Mtt 28:18-19), the only attitude which saves you from failure and chronic defeat is that of “resoluteness.” The word “ resolute” means” showing great determination or in Igbo, “ikata obi.” In other words, Jesus was determined to work for freedom and liberation despite the threat of a collapse of a flourishing Galilean ministry; the threat of the loss of a divine name and that of a shameful death. Jesus’ resolute entrance into Jerusalem (Cf Lk 19: 28) and his crucifixion brought to an end the age long agitation about the war between freedom and slavery.

The resoluteness which Jesus exercised and the attendant passion narrative which must anticipate Easter is an experience which Christians and the entire Nigerian populace is re-living in the Nigerian soil. Moreover, significantly, the 2003 election was conducted on a Holy Saturday - the day Jesus was already in the grave for battle. Between Jesus and the devil; between the law abiding citizens of Nigerian and Manu-led brood of vipers; between our faith and the prognostications of Monday Osunbor of Benin (that operator of the Satanic Empire); between Nigeria (a blessed nation) and global Satanic kingdom; between Our Blessed Lady and goddess of Benin (that perfect externalization of an occult Jezebel); between Fr. Ejike Mbaka and people like pastor W. F.Kumuyi of the Deeper Life Bible Church(the true spiritual Ejiahs of our time) on the one hand and these other numerous prophets and industrial miracle houses of baal who hunt only for miracle and demonstrate only mere polluting intelligence; between a Peter Obi (with a national application) and the Nigeria’s Further, the struggle between good and evil, righteousness and sin, truth and falsity has danced to the demands of the final whistle blown by the impartial referee, sole maker and supreme caretaker of the store of destiny.

Recently, concerning the emerging national Peter Obi, God revealed to me how adversity is only but a pretentious collaborator in the fight against greatness. And as Shakespeare would have it, it is only the eyes of childhood that can fear a painted devil. Also, even though many of us have really allowed ourselves to be messed up by fear, and have broken our covenantal relationship with God, yet He says he makes a more effective covenant with you, with me, your marriage, and your family; with Rivers State and with Nigeria for those who turn to him with sincere and repentant heart. He will never call your sins to mind. He has forgiving you, me your family; organization. He has forgiven RiversState. He has forgiven Nigeria. He says “Deep within them I will plant my law, writing it on their hearts. I will be their God and they shall be my people. We mention specifically those brothers who were intimidated, blackmailed, or brainwashed into joining that occult party called People’s Demonic Party. On the ashes of repentance upon their heads, the foundation of a truly great People’s Democratic Party has been laid. We will ever remain grateful to people like Dr. Chris Ngige of AnambraState for his courage and determination to say No to Satan. The Catholic Archdiocese of Onitsha and the entire Onitsha province should crown him with the title of “Nna Nke Okwukwe 1 “while Peter Obi be crowned “Okwukwe Eji Eje Ogu”. The Anambra Council of Traditional Rulers” should, at least pronounce a sentence of banishment on Chris Uba to complement and complete the judgment of the Appeal Court and bring it to bear on our traditional Igbo life.

This is God’s portion for us-for you and me, for RiversState and Nigeria. We must claim it, even if it means being crucified, being threatened with EFCC and ICPC, being hunted by hired assassins and occult powers. They will come to pass. Adversity is only a pretensions collaborator in the fight against greatness. In the gospels, Jesus says “unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it will not germinate and bear fruits. And in Whiteheadean Process Thought of Reality concrescence is only but the total destruction of initial data to yield an evaluative satisfaction, yet nothing is annihilated but everything is preserved in objective immortality.

In Hebrews, Scriptures says: Christ learnt to obey through suffering, but having been made perfect, he became for all who obey him the source of eternal salvation. In the letter to the Philippians, Chapter 3 vs. 8ff, Paul said: I believe nothing can happen that will outweigh the Supreme advantage of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For him I have accepted the loss of everything, and I look on everything as so much rubbish if only I can have Christ and be given a place in him. I am no longer trying for perfection by may own efforts, the perfection that comes from the Law, but I want only the perfection that comes through faith in Christ, and is from God and based on faith. All I want is to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and to share his sufferings by reproducing the pattern to his death. Not that I have become perfect yet. I have not won. But I am still running, trying to capture the prize for which Christ Jesus captured me. I can assure you my brothers, I am far from thinking that I have already won. All I can say is that I forget the past and strain ahead for what is still to come: I am racing for the finish, for the prize to which God calls us upwards to receive in Christ Jesus. Today, Jesus demonstrated his strong conviction that the cross is the greatest testimony for all people, races and nations.

The price for greatness is not paid in a woman’s kitchen or in the comfort of a father’s bedroom. It is paid at the battlefield. And the greatest battlefield is the battlefield of faith located at Calvary. The victory achieved at Calvary is significant for all times, ages, races, people and fore eternity. There is no victory without a battle. Today we invite you all to victory. We invite Sir. Dr. Peter Odili and President Obasanjo to join us and fight at the battlefield of faith. There is no victory without a war. Today we invite you all to victory. Despite the eclipse, victory is ours. For we are more than a conqueror in Christ Jesus who loved us.

Human life is not a product of chance or luck. Sometimes you see people go to buy Newspapers so as to have a look at the horoscope to see the direction their life will take in the next week or month as the case may be. Some others engage in prognostications of other kinds. At the end of the day, such people trace their destinies to some animals like fish, Pisces, etc. Animals either are not controlling force over our life. Our life is an inestimable action of God which He placed at the center of creation for the purposes of meaning and responsibility in the world. The whole story of life is an attempt to piece together the scattered facts of existence and endow it with meaning and purpose. Our Biblical tradition authoritatively assets that ever since the great but fallen angel, Lucifer failed in this task out of pride and lost the much exalted position he occupied in the hierarchy of beings, having rebelled against God, he himself has sworn an oath that no mere man could win that glory again. From that point, Lucifer ever since declared war on those who are called the children of God. Revelation. The book of Revelation chapter12 describes this situation very well.

Drawing from this episode and credited by the facts of existence, life in itself has become a kind of struggle, a battle for or against God. By the way he lives his life, the human person mobilizes himself and the rest of creation to obey God or rebel against God. History is thus an event and the worlds struggle as engineered by man to choose between good and evil.

The collapse of Communism in 1989, many argue with little opposition, has marked the inauguration of a New World Order. With this has come the re-alignments of world systems and policies together with new developments as well, and of course, not without new challenges too. It was under this excitement that Francis Fukuyama, a political theoretician with the Rand Corporation published his controversial essay of 1989 titled “The End of History.” He later reworked and published it into a book under the title “The End of History And The Last Man.” But can the fall of communism and the forceful assertion of capitalist superiority be taken to be the final evolutionary stage of the human specie and history? Or beyond the victory of capitalism and its reign, whether brief or long, what next? This second question was latter on taken up by Samuel Huntington in his essay of 1993 which was titled, “The Clash of Civilizations.” In 1996, this essay was published into a book with the title”The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order”. In this book, Huntington displaced Fuguma’s argument that liberal capitalist democracy is the most credible system, even though civilizations can work alongside others on the democratic pantheons.

According to Mathew Hassan Kukah, a New World Order depicts an ideological system, after the fall of communism, which promises a total harmonization and integration of existing global structures into an operational and functional machinery at the reach and service of very member of the globe. Against this background, Mathew Hassan Kukah has argued that beyond the debate about “New World Order” or Globalization “ and its promises, and dating back to the French or American revolutions, the actual debate in itself has not been about systems and ideologies but about the meaning of life. According to him, ideologies and systems have sought in various ways to remake the world, to find Eldorado, to create paradise, to install the political kingdom. Etc. Yet, after years of fruitless struggle, humankind always comes back to where it all started. New systems are put in place, they challenge the assumptions of past, install new leaderships and the charade commences all over again. As a result, we should not make too much of the twenty first century or Obasanjo’s economic miracles because there is nothing new under the Sun.

Christian life is not a search for meaning only but also the pedestal which offers the most authentic means of leaving out a meaningful transformed existence. This is achieved in the Church by the Holy Spirit. Thus, following a transformed Hegelian thought, the Holy Spirit must be acknowledged as the only transformative power penetrating every world system and commanding every ideological presupposition to total surrender, and to eventual liberation as a prelude to the achievement of an authentic national and global change or integration. The Holy Spirit is present in and to the Church with abundance of gifts and fruits.

In one of the numerous lectures he delivered in 1932 titled “Democracy: Its Presumptions And Realities,” Learned Hand observed that “Democracy is a means of continuity, a principle of stability, a relief from the paralyzing terror of revolution”. He however did not waste time to confess that he (had) been where this was not true, in lands where one felt the pervasive fore boarding of violence, of armed suppression, the inability of minorities to exert just those peaceful pressures that seem to us so vicious where government is conducted not by compromise but by coup d’etat”. And in my estimation today, I think the land that fits Hand’s description of the rape of democracy is Nigeria. And the consequences are everywhere.

Indeed Sir, Dr. Peter Odili and his wife, Justice Mary Odili, have always demonstrated their faith in God and their dedication to the Church. They are not only true brethrens but also strong pillars of the Church. These and many other great facilitators of our faith and church trapped in the present political waters must not be allowed to be hijacked from us by coded sympathetic sentiments. We must stand guard over them and their entire family, and also over our dear President Obasanjo. In this Mass, we are asking God to guide, guard, protect and bless them in Jesus Name.

We are also asking God to grant them the grace, courage and wisdom to resist the enormous temptation which such an exercise like Constitutional Amendment can bring to the doorstep of those who walk on the corridors of power. We mention specifically the temptation which may come to our dear president to seek re-election any time this year in 2007. With every amount of respect, love and humility we pray God to give President Obasanjo the courage to leave office in 2007 so that we can be proud to have a grandfather like Nelson Mandela. We pray that our beloved brother and leader Peter the Rock understands the implications of the greed for and intoxications of power, and thus help the church persuade President Obasanjo not to seek re-election. We ask God to stand behind Sir Dr. Peter Odili in his ambition that has been divinely confirmed. We ask God to grant him the courage to resist and deal decisively with everything including persons, associations and cliques that might destroy his good efforts and tarnish his image which has cost him so much within these difficult years. We ask God to grant him the vision to continue to seek power through legitimate ways and in a manner that is in consonance with his integrity, faith and established principles of order.

Lord, comfort our president with the words of our father in faith “Abraham”, who told the worrying Isaac that God will provide. God will provide for Nigerians. When Elijah ran to hide in the cave trying to run away from foolish Ahab and wicked Jezebel after he had slain 400 prophets of Baal, God came to him there and said to him “what are you doing here? Elijah said there are 70,000 men who have not yet bowed down to Baal. Arise, go down to the city and anoint Elisha the son of Jehu. Surprisingly, Elisha got a double portion of Elijah’s spirit. We are asking God to grant President Obasanjo, the political Elijah of our time to arise, the grace to go and anoint an Elijah.

God is so much concerned about the present situation of Nigeria and her suffering citizens. Our Blessed Lady is still at the intercession post. It is not the will of God that President Obasanjo and other current political office holders seek re-election after the expiration of their terms of office. The point is that and I quote our Lady.” Third term, no matter the cloak it wears, is a mission in suicide and in the disintegration of Nigeria.” This message is a confirmed message, not a classified one. Moreover, she warns that sometime next year, Okija story will just be a footnote to what will happen in Benin.

President Obasanjo fought to keep this nation together and since he came to power in 1999, he had relentlessly burnt himself out so that Nigeria not only remains one but also become what it should be – a Federal Republic. It will be unfortunate if he facilitates the ruins of his own efforts.

All Christian believers, especially Catholics, must show great concern for our true brothers and sisters who are trapped in the current political mess in Nigeria. Our unfailing love and sense of gratitude must not manifest when we receive money from them to build our comfortable father’s houses and magnificent church buildings. To do this alone is to credit Karl Marx’s dictum that religion – our Catholic faith – is the opium of the people, that is, a heavy intoxicant that makes people drunk and impairs their vision and mental sensibilities. No! Faith is maturity. In our faith is the authentic definition of human worth and dignity found. And to profess this faith in its fullness; in love and gratitude, not only to our brothers and sisters but to God, we must stand on the side of truth no matter how difficult the demand may be. The most visible sign and the authenticity of a well built church does not consist in a beautiful edifice, but on the extent to which her courage can help her stand and defend the truth of the gospel of her founder, our lord and master Jesus Christ.

Moreover, love and gratitude demand strongly that we do not desert our brothers at this most critical moment of decision making. We must offer them a hand of rescue from the cloud of confusion that has covered the political landscape. We must rebuke those sycophants and suicide makers around them. In the Good News edition of the Catholic Bible, the book of Job chapter No 30 vs 8, the word of God calls them” a worthless bunch of nameless nobodies.”

How a man’s choice settles things for time and for eternity! Evangelist Chidi Okoroafor is indeed correct! Choice made the difference between two Sauls. One chose to disobey the inner voice of his conscience and preferred ignorance to knowledge. By so doing, the man whom life and providence fetched out of the dark trenches of anonymity and placed on the path to greatness fell woefully to the destructive claws of greed and pride, despite the abundance God had laid at his feet and command. During the inauguration of Obasanjo’s government in 1999, I recall late Bola Ige saying that if there is any Nigerian whom time and history have favored greatly, it is Mathew Obasanjo. It is unfortunate that Ige is no longer alive to see whether he was right or wrong. On the other hand, one other Saul gave up pride and arrogance, and leaning on the powerful crutches of an embarrassing faith, he took up courage and looked reality on the face. By so doing he became Paul; a household name for all who have a passion for truth.

Is President Obasanjo Nigeria’s own Elijah or Nigeria’s own Fuhrer? Is Sir Dr Peter Odili the Jacob through whom the great “Promise” can be realized for his people or the Esau who sold his birthright for a plate of re-hot stew, and thus became a symbol of a fool’s folly?

God bless all of us!

God bless the Church!!

God bless Nigeria!!!

This homily was preached by Rev. Fr. Kenneth Evurulobi on the 3^rd Sunday of Lent, 2006 at St. Mary’s Procathedral, No.12 Aggrey Road, Port Harcourt. Fr Ken is a doctoral student at The Catholic Institute Of West Africa,(CIWA) Port Harcourt and a visiting pastor to the Parish of St. Mary’s.