Mother earth, Easter and humanity

APRIL – 22 is reserved for celebrating Mother Earth like it is for Easter this year, and it calls for sober reflection on the unrepentant stance of humans, as they destroy the environment, the limited space granted to them by Mother Earth to make beautiful, so as to open up more space for them just like Jesus Christ did in Christian belief, in order to renew humans for God’s grace beyond the suffering they go through under their recalcitrance in obeying the Moses transmitted laws. The stubborn nature of humans is being appealed to by Mother Earth and Easter.

Like Dr Majekodunmi says on the STV news hub, you cannot be claiming you are worshipping God and you create greed policies or behave in ways that harm the destruction of God’s beautiful creation, the planet earth.

In effect, leaders who do not work in tandem with policies that make mother Earth more beautiful deserve to face the consequences by exiting from it and never aiming at benefitting from what Easter stands for – resurrection of the faithful when the trumpet sounds.

Listening to Majekodunmi as well as the topic of Morayo on TVC anchored on forgiveness and sacrifice, all, calling on humans to love themselves and help Mother Earth to protect them as their own contribution is just minimal in immense space of the planet earth.

Discussion on relationships among humans is as well discussion on the entire humanity and the Creator, broken down in different belief systems even among the atheists or agnostics who still cannot live out of any belief system. Depression, restlessness, criminality and self annihilation could set in if there is no humanistic belief system to lean on. And a beautiful and harmonious environment like the mythical Garden of Eden could make humans live and tolerate one another better.

For now humans are in a continuous process of either killing themselves or killing the beauty of the environment by their greed.

When I compare the bluish outlook of the lagoon in Abidjan and the smoky/foggy one of Lagos I come to appreciate what environmentalist Majekodunmi is advocating; that is what leadership can do as Marine police is seen everywhere there. It is also the same thing as making your homes clean and pollution free like Mother Theresa said that if only people can clean their houses and frontage always the environment will be clean; denoting also that if every family should learn how to maintain peace everywhere will be peaceful.

Families make the world and they are either led by a woman or a man. They could be monogamous or polygamous as cultures dictate.

However, rulership on earth seems to be dominated by men and it tends more to managing polygamous living as people tend to believe in many religions, or none, in any given country; and conflicts are bound to happen like the Sri Lankan crisis where killings happened on Easter day. So, why blame God in any religion you find yourself as humans remain the problem.

Nigeria is like managing a polygamous home as toxic relationships and polluted homes are crying out for leadership sacrifice and love as against aloof stance. Morayo and her team expressed their experiences in living as polygamous brought-up except one in the team and it showed in her contribution.

Like mother Earth celebration like Easter celebration; humans needed to learn sacrifices made by the events to rejig their stay on earth. Polygamous homes abound in Nigeria but the attitude of the father matters in getting them right or wrong like it is for leadership in Nigeria.

Morayo had an experience that made the society always remind her that her half brothers and sisters are not the same as same mother same same father siblings; whereas another person lived by what a father made out of the situation by getting them look like same creatures, as mothers were told to distance themselves and allow the children live as if father only mattered and it produced great and manageable sacrifice. Note that it was not a divorcee situation.

Ofcourse, the father provided for the children and gave them homes that look like motherless babies home though their individual mothers were present and never interfered in their domestic relations as such; instead, it was collective motherhood against one father.

The father became truly “Nna anyi” or “Di anyi” for all and it was a great sacrifice like when you hear the richest Nigeria woman narrate also her father’s approach to polygamy. It is not that of a daddy that is a leaching relationship in some African set-up where the father is just there to answer a name with no responsibility attached. That is what Nigerian leaders seem to like, leaching on Nigeria, its resources and the populace not minding their state of poverty and distress; both on mother Earth as the natural provider, and God they seem to be abusing.

Nigerians know that some big men are still in court defending themselves against allegation of leaching Nigeria at the point of claiming 30million litres of fuel were subsidized as they carted away the subsidy money, and quite unrepentant as Easter and Mother Earth beckon, and now there are claims of consuming either 65million or 85million litres and it had made the allegation of 30million a child’s play; and Lagarde’s IMF is warning that $5.2trillion subsidy – about 10% of world GDP as at 2017 – is too much for the greedy daddies of Nigeria. Note that no woman is involved.

Again, they are all resources taken out of the bowel of Mother Earth like gold and other minerals taken out of the bowel of Zamfara space and humans wasted by the greedy daddies to extract them with no regards to the masses or any sense of responsibility or sacrifice for the minimal demand of the masses which are basic needs of life.

Easter reminds the so called daddies that it is time for sacrifice even if it is not repeating the crucifixion type, it demands shedding their greed and reflecting about human condition and the abundance mother Earth has provided that require sensible use.

Greedy use of resources is like greedy clamour for sin; it is toxic for both the body and soul. In the Ten Commandments Moses presented to the world, and as the Lord summarized them in the dispensation of grace, the tenth one concerns greatly the environment – do not covet.

Covetousness lead to both self and other destructions that make the mother Earth reclaim its riches made available for everyone including animals and plants.

Chernobyl, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, gas flaring, oil pollution, sea pollution, all, affect the entire humanity wherever humans are located albeit in some graduated measures. Those occurrences were based on covetousness of men. After the resurrection of Jesus Christ celebrated in Easter, human beings are yet to repent of their sins; especially those that make them not to love their neighbours as themselves. Mother Earth is still providing to keep life going and like Dr Majekodunmi said, just hold your breath for 10minutes and know that all Mother earth is asking you to do is to allow more space for oxygen to come in and life will be sweet.

Policies are needed to create a better environment for clean air and humans will see, more, the bounties of mother Earth; and, in extension, less toxic human relationships and better environment.

• Ariole, Professor of French and Francophone studies, wrote from University of Lagos.