Some Church, Some practice – by Frank Ofili

This is probably a story fit for beer parlour. Many might consider it untrue but the truth is, it happened and it happened to me. I witnessed it ‘live’. And this is the second time I am witnessing such; only this time the experience is more ridiculous than the first. I am still bewildered. May be someone can help to explain this bizarre practice.

Last Saturday, my wife and I set out for her collegue’s wedding at a church at Iyana Ipaja. We turned out in our best clothes – what we call “Ani Akpati” in my dialect.

For some inexplicable reasons, my wife had been nagging and reminding me of that wedding several weeks before that day and I made a promise to attend. Perhaps she knew what was coming, and that as a student of society I would not fail to report it.

When we got to the church, we met so many people outside. They were not allowed into the church. When we inquired why, we were told the reason was because they were decked in accessories forbidden by the church – jewelries and make-ups. They said it was against the doctrine of the church to put on, or wear, anything “artificial”, or anything that has chemical in it – including body cream, perfume, make-up, jewelries etc.

We were told too that the church does not encourage its members to use medication if they fall sick. According to them only prayer is the answer. Ok, no problem there, if that is the way the church choses to worship the Almighty God, but where is it in the Scriptures?

Anyway, to cut the long story short, my wife and I wore all of those things (except body cream for me – I don’t use body cream, never got used to it), so we “kukuma” remained in the car outside until the wedding was over so that we could all proceed to the reception venue.

What followed next however was beyond belief. Some of the church ushers came outside to ask us for offering. Can you beat that? So, they would accept offering from those of us considered too unclean to be allowed into the church to celebrate with a colleague? Ok oh.

Now, the strangest part was that the wedding couple exchanged wedding rings (a form of jewelry); the bride was also fully made up in addition to her white gown, and the groom owns a pharmacy.

Pray, what do they sell in a pharmacy? Drugs of course! Drugs made of some form of chemical or the other which the church expressly forbids! And the leadership knows this but choses to look the other way because the groom is a heavy financial member. Yet they consider those of us who patronize these things as unclean. How much more can hypocrisy get?

Now, some might wonder why I write so much about church. The reason is simple. In our part of the world, apart from God Himself and our immediate family, there is no other institution more influential on our lives than the Church or the Mosque. So, when hypocrisy is going on in such a vital institution, I get pissed off. I know some would readily resort to the much over-used saying that judgment is for God; yes, but I dare say that leaving everything to God is essentially why we are the way we are.