Catholic dioceses in Nigeria have advised priests to skip the Sign of Peace at Mass as one of several measures against the spread of the deadly Ebola virus. West Africa is faces a worsening crisis from the disease. Nigerian priests in some dioceses have also been advised to refrain from giving Communion on the tongue, unless Read more
A Nigerian diocese has banned women from attending church services while carrying hand-bags. Bishop Calistus Onaga of Enugu diocese directed all his parish priests to announce this during recent Sunday Masses. The hand-bag ban is a security measure in response to recent incursions by Boko Haram militants, especially a foiled bomb attack at a church. Read more
In the aftermath of Islamic jihadis — the Boko Haram — enslaving Christian school girls in Nigeria, the Muslim intelligentsia, instead of doing some serious introspection, has chosen to exercise damage control. Columns by my co-religionists have appeared in newspapers ranging from the Toronto Star to The Independent in London and on CNN.com, where they Read more
Lulu Mitshabu tells us to close our eyes. ‘Imagine your brothers, sisters, your mothers, your nieces, your nephews, your children, everybody that makes you smile, the good time you’re having,’ she says. ‘Open your eyes. The time that you took closing your eyes and thinking of your people, imagine now everybody you thought of disappeared Read more
All of us have been and the generations to come, will be born into an inheritance of one kind of another. Part of that inheritance is that we are heirs of a world scarred by the internationalising and industrialising of the slave-owning and slave-trading nations of the past and that much historic prosperity has been Read more
The Roman Catholic and Anglican Archbishops of New Zealand are calling for people to pray for the release and protection of the schoolgirls kidnapped in northern Nigeria. Anglican Archbishops Philip Richardson and Brown Turei, and Roman Catholic Archbishop John Dew, said last Sunday was an opportunity for churches across the country to pray for, and Read more
There’s something quite peculiar and absurd about being a Nigerian. It’s a country of—so to speak—unspecified data and dimensions. Nigeria is not simply plagued by inexactitude; it cultivates numerical and other forms of fuzziness. The other day, Ikhide Ikheloa, one of Nigeria’s most pugnacious gadflies, was waxing indignant on Facebook and Twitter. His grouse? Nigeria has Read more
Catholics in a Nigerian city are risking their lives to attend Sunday Mass, as their community has fallen prey to violence from radical extremists. “There were a lot of bomb explosions, but that did not seem to deter people from coming to church,” said Fr John Bakeni, the celebrant of a March 14 Mass in Read more
The state of religious freedom around the world is “increasingly dire”, according to the chairperson of a United States agency that monitors threats to this human right. The reasons include the rise of violent religious extremism and the actions and inactions of governments, according to Dr Katrina Lantos Swett of the US Commission for International Read more
Interchurch relations in Nigeria have been dealt a blow by the Catholic Church’s decision to indefinitely suspend its involvement in the nation’s 40-year-old ecumenical association. Catholic and Protestant churches formed the Christian Association of Nigeria to promote Christian unity and to speak with one voice on national issues. Catholic leaders have now decided to pull Read more