Of Increasing Religious Violence …My Fears For Coming Generations

A religion is good that teaches men and women to be good. Such good men and women also teach the young, the way they must go, very early in life, so that when they grow up, they will not depart from it.
By its nature, religion is grounded in one of the most delicate values of life-faith-the belief in something not seen. And for that, it engineers in the believer so much passion, commitment, drive and service. But so delicate, it requires tremendous level of tolerance, understanding, patience, long-suffering and above all, love  to nurture .
Like love, it has no room for hate, undue rivalry or even competition. Religion is peaceful because it demands of the believer piety, righteousness and peaceful living. Therefore, the religious cannot be violent, hateful, intolerant, boastful or vengeful.
Today however, all manner of crimes, murders, and destruction are carried out in the name of one faith or another, forcing many to wonder if religion is a blessing or curse, necessary or unnecessary, worthwhile of worthless, because of the tendency of each of the dominant religions to consider itself as the one and only true one and all others satanic and criminal.
In that desperation for members, they either use threats, coarsion, brute force or murders to enforce followership and punish resistance. Such desperation and the attendant violence,  should never be part of any religion, in the first place. This is what has turned a once-peaceful and tolerant society against itself.
In their desperation to win, they fashion extremist ideologies to force fear and compliance and unleash horror on those who question their style. Today, it is difficult to differentiate Islamic extremism from outright insurgency, because of the nature of violence both unleash to society.
Here in Nigeria, the Islamic extremist group Boko Haram is an example. It has waged a relentless war against the Nigerian state, peopled not only by those of other religions, but also Islam and in the process killed defenceless men, women and children at peace time, using ideologies which true believers say, have nothing to do with the teachings of the holy Quoran.
At first, their crusade was against Western education, which they adjudged to be a sin. Second they outlawed girl-child education, insisting instead that every young woman must marry as a child and end-up in the kitchen, without considering the imperatives of a fast changing world, that makes life without basic education worthless.
For that, virtually every public place, be it a school, hospital or police unit is now a terrorist potential target. On the last count, lives of some 13 thousand Nigerians and others who live and do business here have been cut short brutally and property worth millions of naira destroyed.
Apart from the senseless bloodletting and crusade to annex and create an Islamic caliphate for itself, the group, not too long ago, kidnapped more than 200 children of Chibok school in Borno State and to date, have not released them all, except those known to have escaped and one recently let go, because of weakness. She was later found to be four months pregnant.
No one can yet tell the fate of others still in captivity. And the killings continue by way of terrorist attacks.
Committed Muslims have repeatedly condemned as unIslamic, the modus operandi of Boko Haram, that such style negates what the holy book preaches. They insist that Islam is neither boastful nor forceful, hateful nor hasty. Instead, they insist Islam demands free-will conversion and not by force. Islam, they insist, preaches love, tolerance and indeed peace without which human progress and development will be at great risk.
Yet Boko Haram continues with a violent campaign that continues to have negative effect on potential converts. The young people are erroneously being made to believe that their chosen religion is a violent one, because those who should step forward and save Islam of the negative publicity, daily enjoyed, value political gains more than a peaceful living that allows the believer to practice the values of his or her faith. On the long run, when so much harm had been done to their psyche – their deepest feelings and attitudes, the young generation would have nothing pious to hold on to but embrace violence as part of a religion. They too will become enemies to themselves and society and would not be blamed if they do.
While Nigerian politicians fail to see the insurgency from that perspective and instead look the other way as lives of fellow Nigerians are being cut-short in the most barbaric of ways, countries in the Middle-East are battling to save their faith and deliver their own from the violence of those bent on rewriting the Holy Quoran in colours of blood.
Going by the identity, Islamic State (ISIS), that extremist group of fighters has been on an expansionist drive grounded in violence, annexing lands, maiming the innocent and declaring an Islamic caliphate of their own imagination.
Purely against the group’s style, of be-heading defenceless people of violent crimes and of daily destruction of properties, fellow Islamic states in the middle East, including Saudi Arabia and Qatar in coalition with the United States of America (USA) are on a positive Jihah to save a religion in danger, people’s lives at great risk and future of children in confusion.
In parts of Syria and Iraq, the battle line seems drawn with air bombardments, as true Muslims seem ready to give their lives to save a religion that teaches men and women to be good, to be peaceful, loving, caring and tolerant. A religion that abhors forceful conversion, hatred and violent attacks on fellow humans without good reason.
This is a good war which religions preach and urge the faithful to fight against with all their might.
This is the kind of war that politicians of Nigeria’s Northern extraction, be they Muslims or Christians ought to wage against an ill-advised crop of fake Moslems, whose preachings have nothing to do with the Quoran or the Bible, rather than sit-by and count the losses against the government in power.
The time has come for one and all particularly, the political class to rally behind the Nigerian troops, and the coalition of West African states, to crush everything that is Boko Haram in the country because the activities of the group indeed amount to an ill-wind that does no one any good.
They must leave behind or keep aside individual ambitions and together form a common front to tackle a common enemy bent on redefining how Nigerians live their lives through an orgy of violence.
This is because without peace, no meaningful politicking can take place, not to talk of progress and development. Without peace, families are torn apart, children’s education truncated, lives are endangered and even peaceful worship, at great risk. In a country, where, a supposed Islamic group will consider their own, as target cannot be a peaceful one.
That is why the faithful must continue to preach peace, love, piety, tolerance and mutual-co-existence as an antidote to the senseless bloodletting rooted in hate-filled messages that have nothing to do with the holy books. That way, the younger generation would at least know that the older generations tried. That they, at least, offered an alternative to violence that young people could choose from.
The very value of any religion lies in its sustainability, its ability to survive challenges like the Boko Haram insurgency that tends to confuse the faithful and potential converts. They must not celebrate the violent exploits of the group in ways that negatively affect the Nigerian troops who are bent on securing the land and defending the way Nigerians live their lives, against the dictates of terrorists.
My Agony is that up till this moment, many politicians still see the on-going war on terror as a defining battle for President Goodluck Jonathan‘s re-election, and loss of the battle, his defeat. It should not be so. This war on terror is one between good and evil, love and hate and above all, sane religion and that of violent disposition.
It is everyone’s war against evil. Above all, in defence of a good religion.

Soye Wilson Jamabo

Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor And Sultan of Sokoto