Amidst the ravaging insecuri-
ty being witnessed across the
country, a word of caution has
gone out to Christians not to allow
themselves to be provoked into em-
barking on conventional war fare with
the perpetrators of evil in the land.
Making this admonition recently, the
Catholic Archbishop of Lagos Most Rev
Alfred Adewale Martins advocated -the
use of non violence and truth in con-
fronting the unconventional ‘war fare’
that has become a daily occurrence.
“Christians must stand to ‘wage
war’ against the menaces that give us
a horrific stare, with all the weapons of
Christian moral values and a surprising
attitude of non-violence to a violent so-
ciety.”
“The current socio-political clime of
our dear country Nigeria, is indeed vol-
atile as we witness almost intermittently
the unbridled spate of killings, shameful
insecurity techniques at all levels and a
sheer lack of respect for our common
humanity.
Our war isn’t that of bloodshed, venge-
ance, anger, hatred but the conquering
of evil and its perpetrators with the light
of truth and the balance between faith
and reason that exalts humanity as the
centre of every endeavour.”
Archbishop Martins lamented the
callous manner Christians were being
killed in Nigeria for no just reason, not-
ing that the situation was getting out of
hand and poses a big challenge to the
stability of the country.
Amidst the numerous challenges
they confront with on daily basis in the
country, he charged them to remain
focused on Christ whose exemplary
mode of operation differs from that of
the world which nurses an eye for an
eye, a tooth for a tooth.
While urging them not to deny the
reality of the ‘war fare’ or to lie about it,
he noted that they must always strive
to imitate Christ who in the midst of
provocations restrained himself from
physical brawls with his detractors.
Here him: “Are we going to lie about
how tempted we are to revenge and
send a message that we aren’t fools?
No, we cannot. Yet the very question
that strikes us at heart is, what would
Jesus do and what would he have us
do?”
He then encouraged all Christians to
continue to live a life of coherent wit-
nessing to the Gospel, reminding them
of the words of Jesus, “Do not be afraid
of those who kill the body but cannot
kill the soul; rather, be afraid of the one
who can destroy both soul and body in
Gehenna” (Matthew 10: 28)
