A short while ago I read on a blog about Charity Uzoechina (now Aishat), the daughter of a Pastor who converted to Islam. The actual story I read which prompted this short piece wasn’t even about her conversion but about her proposed marriage to her Muslim heartthrob. Ordinarily, a wedding announcement inspires positive felicitations from all and sundry, however in Charity’s case, I was stunned that most of the comments directed at her were negative, while some were out right curses – Charity’s crime was that she left Christianity to join Islam.
READ SOME SPECIMEN COMMENTS BELOW –
“Can u imagine the nonsense? From light to darkness…I pity ur future…in anoda word (sic) d Muslim re very fetish so I don’t doubt dat dey would av charmed her to become a Muslim….abomination tinzzz..tufiakwagi charity..chai ewooooo aluuuu.”
“Get ready to be standing outside the mosque just because you’re a woman.get ready to be degraded just because you’re a woman.”
“Hian!!! Nw I believe d world v cme to an end. Babes nd fish brain.hw cme d dude didn’t chnge to xtian religion since d love is dt strong. She nw zapped to muslim. Nne ngwanu, am sure u wil tel us ur story later. Am here watching#flips weaves nd walks away#”
Some people did wish her well, some were indifferent, but majority of the comments were tilted towards the venomous samples quoted above and were apparently spewed by CHRISTIANS! Funny enough, when a Muslim converts to Christianity, these same Christians hail the convert. I’ve heard most of us declare that one’s choice of worship was dependent on one’s free will, however experience has shown me that in actual practice ‘freedom of worship’ is more of a myth because society is balkanized and each faction has a way of hounding individuals with certain religious expectations.
The amusing thing is that the Muslims get the greater blame for religious fundamentalism, obviously for global religious violence perpetrated by certain Islamic factions, however, it will surprise most of us that Christians bring their own brand of fundamentalism in certain subtle ways and in some cases violent ways as well. In one example, I was at my cousin’s wedding and just as the minister in charge was about to join the couple, he inquired whether the Bestman was a member of the church, the Bestman wasn’t and to most people’s dismay the minister in charge asked him to step aside as best man! A Christian gentleman who travelled all the way to the East from the North and lodged in a hotel just to honour his friend was bounced from the role his good friend appealed to him to come and play at his wedding because of his denomination! We have heard of issues of violence in some churches and also of situations where people neglect family and every other thing in their life to attend to religious activities, etc.
Fundamentalism is defined basically as the demand for a strict adherence to orthodox theological doctrines. Historically, in practice, fundamentalism appears to be an assemblage of ideologies propagated by intellectual religious elite as an instrument for the manipulation of the less intellectual religious masses, hence while those elite put religion aside in their high places and collaborate in commerce and industry, their ardent followers fight each other to propagate their masters’ religions or religious brands; by ‘religions and religious brands’ I mean if it’s not Christian minions fighting Muslim minions, it’s Christian minions from church A fighting Christian minions from church B and so on and so forth. Most religious leaders these days are wealthy business moguls who do business across religious and cultural borders, whereas down the food chain, various religious faithful have been indoctrinated to regard people of other faiths or even same faith but different group with disdain and distrust.
This disdain and distrust explains why total strangers will vehemently condemn a young lady’s choices and totally feel justified in doing so. Most of the people that cussed-out, cursed and condemned Aishat do not know her, they do not know what she’s faced and they certainly have no clue as to what informed her choices, yet a good number of my Christian brothers and sisters who are quick to invoke the ‘DO NOT JUDGE’ clause – especially when their pastors are in the eye of the storm – have indicted, judged and gone ahead to condemn Aishat.
I am a Christian but as far as I know, so long as one’s choices do not infringe on another’s rights, why should one be condemned for making those choices? Only GOD in his infinite wisdom has the final say in certain matters and I hope that we humans could learn to really practice what we preach. We need to be careful. May God be with Aishat always.
Chukwudi Madu is a Contributing Editor at The Trent; a writer focused on creative writing, copywriting and technical writing. He is a proud alumnus of the prestigious Government College Umuahia (following in the steps of great Umuahians like Chinua Achebe, Vincent Chukwuemeka Ike, Elechi Amadi, I. N. C. Aniebo, Ken Saro-Wiwa and Christopher Okigbo) and an alumnus of the University of Nigeria Nsukka. He tweets @maduchuddi. His Facebook page is HERE. You can buy his books HERE.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
