There is a saying that religion is the opium of the masses. Nowadays, however, the new generation prosperity pastors have made religion a very lucrative business. Napoleon said that ‘Religion is an excellent instrument that can be used to keep the common people quiet. Religion keeps the poor from killing the rich’. In recent times however religion has crept out of where it was supposed to be stored safely, to rear its head, in politics.
Today we look at religious differences in the world at large while noting for starters that Nigeria and France, which especially holds my attention today.
Lets take a look at the situation in France where an Islamist terrorist decapitated a teacher who was teaching freedom of expression in France. A country that its motto is Liberty, Equality, Fraternity. For supporting the decapitated teacher and making him a National hero , Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan asked the French president Emmanuel Macron to see a psychiatrist literally and Erdogan said truculently that the French want to start another Crusade .
The Vatican in Rome Pope Francis shocked Catholics world wide when he called gay couples children of God who are entitled to civic marriages to secure their union.
While all these religious rumbles were going on abroad, Nigerians woke up from the curfew of the violent anti SARS protests on police brutality to see the Igbosere High Court and police stations razed to the ground by hoodlums and miscreants who hijacked the protest.
To be honest with you, I do not know whether to mourn silently or cry, the way the anti SARS protest went and ended was so shocking.Protests are part of democracy and I do not think that there is anywhere in the world where people protest more regularly than France and the United States. But such protests do not disturb those who have other things to do as the Anti SARS protests did and it was hijacked by thugs.
The miscreants must have misread the music, food and excitements of the protesters as a slap on their faces. They became miserable and vented their anger on our public buildings. The politicians then took the advantage to use them as a distraction to discredit the good work the protesters were doing. They then tried to use religion to stop the real protesters which wasn't successful. Little wonder they sent military to shoot directly at peaceful protesters at the lekki toll gate. I am still waiting for them to come out and own up to the fact that they (government) gave the kill order.
When all is said and done, we left with nothing but religion. So therefore, i pray for a Nigeria where the youths, can live safely in our society, both day and night with fear of their sexuality or speaking up for themselves.
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