In the Old Testament, God enunciated to the people of Israel, the animals they must eat and the one they must not. Hence some animals prescribed, others he proscribed. One of the proscribed animals was pig which is why the story of the woman who was killed with her seven (7) sons in the book of Maccabees, was told. But in the New Testament, when Peter was told to kill and chop in the Acts of The Apostles and he retorted, saying he does not eat anything unclean, God rebuked him and commanded that nothing created by him should be termed unclean. Hence the new order came-that Christians could now eat all things created by God without treating any with disdain. The reason is simple. God is all good, and he created all things. Now, if God who is all good created all things, therefore all things are good; drawing from the goodness of their originator.

Again, the Bible is replete with the admonition of equality of all before God. And if any institution was to obey this most religiously, it should be the Church. But why did Archbishop Obinna of Owerri Archdiocese withdraw his seminarians from Bigard Memorial seminary? I will tell you the story.

Around late 2008 and early 2009, there ensued an acrimony between the college of Formators, or what you would call leadership, of Bigard Memorial seminary Enugu and the Seminarians. The acrimony bothered on many things but it threatened the process of formation of the future of the church(seminarians), that the Vatican had to move swiftly to quench the smoldering fire before it starts to burn.

When delegates from Rome arrived at the Seminary, the applied the principle of fair hearing by listening to both parties and at the end, the Seminarians were given the liberty to elect, from among the college of formators, who they wanted to become the rector so there would be peace. Note that the Catholic Church values it's institution over any individual no matter how valuable. What this means is that the church would always choose it's corpus over a single member of the corpus. If such member defies such decision as reached by the church, then let him be anathema.

Now, the result of the election conducted by the students came, and a relatively unknown priest from Abakaliki diocese, Theophilus Ukoro Igwe, was unveiled as the choice of the students. This was a hard pill to swallow for some. And it is simple. The Abakalikis has always been given the treatment given to the Abokis. Seen as a primitive man, an Abakaliki is not seen to be fit to take care of even vegetables. But here was an Abakaliki man about to lead the almighty Bigard. That the southeastern secular society treats the Abakalikis as second class humans is not a surprise; what is most surprising is that such would also be the story in the Church which preach equality and would sometimesderide governments for any observable act of unequal treatment meted out to citizens.But while some elected to keep numb over their disappointment at the emergence of an Abakaliki priest to lead Bigard Memorial Seminary as Rector Magnificus, Archbishop Obinna of Owerri Archdiocese chose to move into open protest by withdrawing his seminarians from Bigard and never sent his seminariansto Bigard for formation in the entire nine (9) years reign of Theophilus U. Igwe. His reason was simple, "what does an Abakaliki man have to impact on my Seminarians? "

But this is a man who would stand on the pulpit and deride the reach for seeing themselves higher than the poor. This is a man who must have lent his voice in condemning the metaphysics of some European philosophers which denied the African man of soul. This is a man who stands as a symbol of morality and spirituality to his flock. What messagedid he pass to those he is leading? Where did his knowledge of the Bible go? Would he hide in the garb that he tookan existential decision?To me, and to all right thinking Christians, this act of his Grace is highly reprehensible. An act that should not be carried out by any Christian, not to talk of the head of a Christian community who his followers look up to for both moral and spiritual inspiration.This piece became imperative due to the fact that there are many Archbishop Obinnas both within the secular and the Christian societies who still see the Abakaliki man as something next to animals. This is metaphysically fallacious and must not be allowed to go on anymore.

Written by:

David Awol Umoke.

http://tothepotters-house..com/2017/06/discrimination-in-church-why-archbishop.html