Through tragedy and trauma: A blessed message to a Bleeding Nation
Over 2,500 years ago, the learned Greek Philosopher, Plato, posited that “Only dead men have seen an end to war”. Today, those words are still sharply marked with leon fire on the marble of human history —there’s still war for the living! In other words, until now, many an individual, many a family, organisation and nation have had to dig through the shrapnel strewn dark canals. I mean those moments of intense agony — an inexorable inescapable moments of sliding into the grim night of horror, tragedy and trauma, which mangles the soul of the individual or nation, after all soul-craft means statecraft. These periods are bereft of hope, peace, unity and love songs. These are times that disrespect our self-determination status and undermine our collective intelligence.
And when I look at my dear homeland, I see a nation that has survived multiple shocks and imbalances. Today, I see a nation bleeding and suffocating through the dark alleys of civil betrayal and blood-spilled. Almost everyone is strained in the process as the land is stained with the precious blood of people, some of whom are unfortunate victims of leadership abuse and civil violence. And what shall we say when the rules do not fit the games? Sincerely, we do not pray for a repeat of a vicious cycle. We do not want to weave back our nation to the cataclysmic cauldron of war like at the first.
That’s why this timeless message is invaluable to all of us. We are aware that the government of the land has set up measures to address the problems recently protested about and to compensate the families of those that have lost their loved ones during the hair-splitting storm across the nation, but much more is the need to deal with the likely continuous war in the individual soul. The externalities may be resolved easily by a few statements of leadership apology and political compensation, but the internalities would still have to be handled essentially, because it is not in all cases that the systemic responses to the externals will answer for the internal fights.
The large strain of irony would be that many offended families may simply smile receiving whatever offer of commiseration from the government and public-spirited individuals, but the retaliatory tendency may quite be lurking within. And they may want to revenge for their damaged properties, ransacked businesses and deceased ones especially. This is because the hurt on the human soul tends to bear longer to heal than any physical malady. It’s more painful to be (deeply) lacerated within. We know it because the language of the soul is simply one all over the universe. But we cannot lose heart! We cannot stop hoping for the best in our time and in the future for our nation. It is our only land – the land of ancient African warriors. And sadly enough, we are in the days where sprinting abroad during times of national crises or epidemic outbreaks are as inimical as staying home. So, we have here to stay, and to make it a better place for all.
The message therefore, is that we are pleading with the offended citizens of our dear country to consider by the grace of God the calling of armistice to the war that may still be raging within them. The irony in the situation of offense is that one who’s not the offended or victim, and is not experiencing any pain at the moment has a strange ability of pontificating forgiveness with angelic perfection until such is also deeply wounded and the struggle to forgive gets started. But I think I share in the pain of losing loved ones to untimely deaths.
And besides, having survived some deep pains from derogatory slurs and a crisis that rattled the very core of my being, it’s embarrassing to admit that the bitterness that results from such offenses is highly corrosive. On this wise, I realise why the famed South African Clergy, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, having endured so much torture under the defunct apartheid system came out to mention that he had to forgive so that un-forgiveness would not corrode his being. Nelson Mandela came out of incarceration preaching the same message of forgiveness. Corie Ten Boom came out of the German concentration camp, having witnessed with his father and sister the horrors of the regime of the Austrian mad man, Adolf Hitler and preached the same message of forgiveness after struggling with un-forgiveness when she saw one of her abusers in the incarceration camp. Immaculee Libagiza , one of the survivors of the Rwandan genocide who had lost her entire family to the ethnic cleansing act that took place in the country in 1994, came out and forgave the enemies who decimated her family members during the crisis and went on to carry the message of healing and forgiveness to a hurting world.
And Nigeria is hurting today as we speak; the nerves of individuals and the government have been greatly injured. The nation and some people are experiencing what psychologists refer to as Post-traumatic Stress Disorder(s). The hurt and harm have been done already so to say. Let’s pray and preach healing through forgiveness. We appeal to the citizenry to forgive the government for their excesses and negligence, giving them time to clean up the resultant mess and sit up as well. Equally, we appeal to the government to forgive the citizenry for their impropriety and violence which have led to the occasion of arson, looting and blood-shed in the land. And more so, I invite everyone who has not yet been forgiven by the great Judge of the quick and the death to line up at the foot of the Cross and find peace with God!
#healnigeriaandhealtheworld#
