At the 6th Global South Conference in Cairo from 3–8 October, Anglican Primates were encouraged to address the challenges to God’s truth and justice in their own provinces, not only those in the West.
Archbishop Nicholas Okoh, the Primate of All Nigeria, spoke of the challenges facing his Church.
The economic situation
‘The economic situation is getting tougher by the day. The value of our Naira is down, so much so that one US dollar is worth 500 Naira. [A drop of about 50% in the value of the Naira since April 2016. Ed]. People cannot eat; school fees and house rents cannot easily be paid. Many are living in debt. If you have to attend to these basic needs, your generosity to the church will be affected. We are introducing austerity budgets.
The Anglican Communion crisis
‘Whatever is happening in the Anglican world affects us and our ministry directly. People are promoting a homosexual lifestyle and same sex marriage all around the world. When we do social or evangelistic ministry in rural areas we are stigmatised. We live in a competitive religious environment. Other denominations and ministries try to put the Anglican Church down. We try as much as we can to explain, as you cannot really say that you are not an Anglican.
Insecurity
‘In the North we have Boko Haram. The Diocese of Damaturu, [in the very Northeast of Nigeria] has completely disappeared. We have just translated the bishop there to the Diocese of Zaria [also in the North but further south]. He will continue his ministry there until we are able to resolve the issue in Damaturu. The Dioceses of Maiduguri [also in the Northwest] and Yola [on the Eastern bor- der] are operating in a skeleton form. They have been badly affected, as has Kano.
‘In the South, Niger Delta militants are contending for more share in the Niger Delta revenue. They are suffering ecologically and say that the government is not giving them due attention. The Niger Delta is an Anglican stronghold and so it is a big challenge to us.
‘The Fulani herdsmen are killing people in the countryside. They carry AK47s, shoot, kill, rape and commit brigandage. They have no discipline of weapon-handling. It is terrible for such people to carry sophisticated weapons. The individual farmers in the rural areas cannot easily go to farm. The women who form the bulk of the labour force in the rural areas cannot easily move about.
‘We have called on the government to disarm them. The law of the country says nobody is authorised to bear arms. But here people are bearing arms and no one is talking to them.
Independence movement
‘Another group in the South East is the Movement for [the Actualisation of ] the Sovereign State of Biafra. The children of the civil war between 1967 and 1970 have grown [up] and are asking for independence. They say that they have no space in the Nigerian state and are not being given due recognition, They disrupt activities. In our last Standing Committee meeting we could not finish because they threatened to demonstrate all over the Eastern region and that would affect people.’
‘We are pleading with government to see how much dialogue it can do with them. If it is all about marginalisation there should be a solution. Especially as the Government of the Federal Republic is insisting there must be one Nigeria, Everybody should have a foothold in the central government, We are pleading with all the authorities concerned to try to show understanding.’
Corruption
Stanley Ntagali, Archbishop of Uganda, called for Christians to transform their countries and confront false teaching and corruption. ‘Africa is the richest continent with the poorest people. We need our mindset changed. God has endowed us with riches – the heritage of Christianity in the northern part of Africa in the early centuries of the Church. We must start from within – and be an agent of God’s transforming and liberating love. We need to bring people to Jesus who is able to save’, he added.
Archbishop Ntagali highlighted corruption as an example of a practice which arises from false teaching: ‘In Africa we have corruption. We have been removing Jesus from the centre. In our countries corruption is a result of this; false teaching on sexuality is a result of this. People who came, through many hardships, to our country changed us through the gospel. We are ourselves to blame if we do not preach the real gospel. We should not blame others.’
Archbishop Stanley listed other challenges including nominalism, secularism, materialism, liberalism, violence, terrorism, Islamic radicalisation, youth unemployment and the commercialisation of the gospel. ‘Preaching has often become a business’, he warned.
