CBCN SECOND PLENARY HOLDING AT ABEOKUTA, AN ADDRESS PRESENTED BY THE PRESIDENT,MOST REV. AKUBEZE

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INTRODUCTION

Praise be to our Lord Jesus Christ who has always been protecting and providing for us Nigerians in a special way. When many people look at situation we are presently, they wonder why we still have the level of peace we have in our country. Many nations never had challenges as close to what we are presently experiencing  and they are at war; war that has led to the death and destruction of many lives. We just know that God has been kind to us. God has been giving us many opportunities to get it right. If we do not do it right, I am afraid what are we going to tell God? I will come back to this subject matter of the nation again.

Let me first express our profound gratitude to His Excellency, Most Rev Dr Peter Kayode Odetoyinbo, the Bishop of Abeokuta diocese, his priests and Lay faithful who are hosting us. We have been very well received and checked into good accommodations you have provided for us. My Lord Bishop, thank you very much. May God continue to bless you and the good people of Abeokuta Diocese. Amen.

Your Grace, Most Rev. Dr. Antonio Filipazzi, I greet you on behalf of members of the CBCN. We are grateful to you for the close working assumption of office. You have made the joys, happiness, sorrows, and pains of Nigerians your own. We are grateful to you. Extend our appreciation to the Holy Father, Pope Francis for always being close to us in prayer. Most of the tragedies that are reported to him, he quickly makes statements that are reassuring to everyone. Many times we have heard him say he is very close to us in prayers. Only recently he blessed 600 rosaries and sent them to the people suffering in Syria. Your Excellency, let the Holy father know that the over 22 million Catholics in Nigeria are praying for him daily. May God bless our Holy father and may he be strengthened with the grace that comes from above. Amen. We have already expressed this desire to him during our Ad Limina visit to Rome. His presence in Nigeria will bring blessings and transformation to us.

JUSTICE AND PEACE AND NECESSARY FOR A SUSTAINABLE NIGERIA

It is obvious to many Reasonable people that a society that want to grow, develop and build for the future must first have peace. Development does not take place during crisis. People do not build their economy during crisis. What leads to crisis in every part of the world is injustice. Injustice is fertile ground for breeding violence, for creating war, for promoting generational prejudice, it is the ground for destruction prejudice, it is the ground for destruction. If anyone desires peace, the person must work for justice. Justice requires us to give everyone their due. From sharing of resources to caring for the human person. Where there is no fair share of wealth there will be crisis. Very often the simple index for judging how just a society has been in sharing wealth. The lower the fences, the more just the society have been in sharing wealth among the citizens. The higher fences are symbols of insecurity that comes from unjust sharing of wealth. It is therefore pertinent that we as a nation must ensure equity in the sharing of this country. We must ensure accountability and transparency in the use of public funds. It is only when we have peace that we can aspire to a sustainable development. We Catholics must preach daily this message of peace and justice. It is part of the message of Christ. It is part of the mission of the church. As missionaries we must be harbingers of justice and peace in our land.

THE MISSIONARY MONTH OF OCTOBER

Pope Francis has drawn the attention of all of us to the Extraordinary  Missionary month of October 2019. The reason is to mark the centenary of the apostolic letter Maximum Illud issued by pope Benedict XIV on 30 November 1919. This document is worth celebrating because it reminds us of the very essence of the church. It reminds us of the reason the church exists. Maximum Illud reminds us of the nature of the church. It reminds us of the mission of Christ to the church. It reminds us of the urgent need to evangelize the world. We are to go out and make disciples for Christ in all nations. We are to preach the gospel to those who have not yet heard the Word. We are to preach the gospel with new vigour to those who have heard the gospel before. The gospel is ever new and it is always good news. The message of salvation brings hope to the hopeless; it transforms the heart of sinners into saints; it brings prosperity to a nation that upholds the law of God; the gospel creates environment where mutual hatred is eliminated and peaceful co- existence that comes from just sharing of God given resources to thrive.

The forthcoming National Mission Congress is an opportunity for us all, the Christian faithful to reflect on the meaning of the missionary mandate of Christ. It is an opportunity for us to access the effectiveness of our response to this mandate and above all, it is an opportunity for us to reignite our zeal for the mission so that filled with the Holy Spirit like the apostles, we will go out and bear witness to the gospel of Christ. The events at the universal, national and local levels give us the opportunity to once again celebrate our mission as a church. This National Mission Congress that we are about to celebrate has multiple faces.

In calling for the celebration of the Extraordinary Missionary Month of October, 2019, the Holy Father gave for dimension of the activities to constitute this celebration, one of which is that we focus on ‘’the witness of the saints, the Missionary Martyrs, and the Confessors of Faith, who are unique expressions of the churches throughout the world ‘’(Cf. Letter of Fernando Cardinal Filoni to all local ordinaries, 3rd December, 2017). To identify these missionary saints to be celebrated, proposals were sent from all over the world to the Holy See. On November 30, 2018, the life history of twenty-five saints figures chosen are from Nigeria: Blessed Micheal Iwene Tansi and Vivian Ogu from the Catholic Archdiocese of Benin City.

THE STATE OF THE NATION

Since our last plenary, there have been many crisis in our land. The conflicts between the herdsmen and farmers have continued. The constant killings and kidnapping of Nigerians have continued. Only recently we heard of the burning of Rev. Fr Tanko of Jalingo Diocese to Death; and only recently we heard of killing of a priest in Enugu Diocese, and many other unreported cases. Dearly beloved in Christ, at difficult times like this, we need to enlighten our people about their civic rights and turn to God for help. God has not abandoned us. The slow or sometimes lack of prompt Government response to these crisis have continued. At various times we have called on the Government to stop to deal seriously with the issues of insecurity in the land. We have urged the Government to stop celebrating the few instances of what they call success by stating that the terrorists have been technically defeated. Nigerians do not want to have a debate on the meaning of the word ‘’defeated.’’ We are just interested in living our lives peacefully without any fear of being kidnapped for ransom or being driven from our home land. Nigerians do not want to be fed with the daily task of looking for security persons to escort them to their farms. Nigerians do not want to be afraid when they go to the market to sell or buy; or when they go to the Church or Mosque to pray. We are not asking for too much. We just want to live and care for our families. We want to be able to live freely in our country. Every Government that fails to protect the constitutional rights of her citizens has failed. The Government, if it does not respond rapidly to change the situation for good is gradually losing legitimacy. If the leaders of a country cannot ensure peace and security, they have no business using tax payers money to provide security for themselves and their families while the rest of Nigerians are dying daily.

Another area of great concern to many Nigerians is the need for the government to work for national integration of every part of Nigeria in sensitive positions of governance at the Federal level. Every part of Nigeria does have competent people who are patriots and deserve to serve in very important Federal positions. The lack of diversity in the appointments by this government   at the federal level should be reviewed with the aim of assuring every Nigerian that appointments  to positions of importance is not based on the number of people who voted for you from those area. The President is the President of every Nigeria. He has the same obligation to those who voted for him. He uses the taxes from people who voted for him and those who did not vote for him Therefore, equity is expected in appointment of persons to Federal agencies. Nigerians reject a minimalistic approach to these issues. We have heard the government say that they have fulfilled the constitutional requirement of appointment at least a minister from each state. This is a minimalistic approach and does not fulfil the Spirit of total integration of every Nigerian. All Federal agencies should have Directors and Staff that reflect the diversity in our land. No Federal agency should be dominated by one ethnic group or one religious’ group. Nigeria belongs to every one of us. We must not establish cultural hegemony or a religious hegemony in a constitutional secular state like Nigeria. If we allow it, I can assure you that it is a recipe for disaster.