The Pastoral Life and Security Forum was recently held in Burkina Faso. The forum looked at the issue of attacks on Christians in West Africa. Bishop Wilfred Chikpa Anagbe from Nigeria spoke about his frustration and anger about the situation, but also stated clearly that the Gospel was the answer to the current problems.

By ACN Staff

On 30th November and 1st December, the Pastoral Life and Security Forum was held in Burkina Faso with the funding and support of Aid to the Church in Need (ACN). The forum addressed the issue of the persecution of Christians in West Africa. In attendance were representatives of all the diocese in Burkina Faso and representatives from other countries in the region. In total, around 200 attendees were present at the summit.

The opening speech was given by the Catholic Bishop of Makurdi, Nigeria, Mgr Wilfred Chikpa Anagbe. The bishop expressed his anger at the murder of scores of people in his diocese, including two priests, over the last few years. Christians in Nigeria are targeted by organized Islamist terrorist groups such as Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province, and also by Muslim Fulani herdsmen. Over the last few years, there has been a sharp increase in kidnappings of Christians for ransoms.

Bishop Wilfred spoke about the impact of persecution in his diocese:

“In my own diocese there are over 1.7 million displaced persons. In spite of these numbers of IDPs, we continue to support our fellow citizens with food and clothing in the best traditions of our faith…I share with you the sad incidence of the killing of two of my priests, Frs. Felix Tyolaha and Joseph Gor who were brutally murdered on 25 April 2018 along with 17 of their parishioners while celebrating Mass…On 1 January 2018, the jihadists invaded a village in Guma, within my diocese, and killed seventy-two people with scores injured.”

The bishop elaborated further:

“I feel some furious anger, some hot anger inside me; yes, we need to be outraged by events happening in our country due to religious persecution or we will descend into total anarchy, with our pious or meaningless hypocrisy of political correctness…As a Christian, and a Catholic, my religion teaches me, and my spiritual experience demands, that we overcome evil with Good. We remember the victims, but not with the desire for vengeance or as an incentive for hatred…Our role as God’s ministers is that of inspiring hope. The pain is great, and the wounds will take time to heal; without faith we cannot please God and this faith must be practical. As leaders, the challenge we face demands that we take practical steps of faith to heal and restore the hope of the people. We must demonstrate the required tenacity to remove the humiliation from our brothers and sisters whose dignity and rights have been constantly abused by a people bent on exterminating them simply because of different beliefs.”

The bishop fished by stating that there must be dialogue between Muslims and Christians in West Africa, and hard questions must be asked and addressed. For insistence, the bishop said that Christians must raise the content that is being preached by some Muslim leaders as he believes this does contribute to the attacks on Christians. The bishop concluded that honest national dialogue is needed in Nigeria to get to the root of religious extremism and violence in the country and to solve the issue.