The Nigerian Same Sex Marriage Bill and Global outrage

Source: huhuonline.com

It is amazing to experience the kind of unity of purpose the developed world has shown in condeming the Nigerian legislative bill seeking to criminalise same sex  marriage in Nigeria. It is also revealing the kind of unity of national purpose that is possible in

 Nigeria 's defiance of this foreign pressure. The issue of same sex marriage can be resolved only via a higher knowledge of the purpose of man on earth. Unfortunately, this higher knowledge exists only in fragments in present religious configurations. You may need to grow above religion itself to comprehend it.

The first recorgnition that must hit us is the fact that the world as a whole is going somewhere. There is a purpose for existence, which may be different from what the super powers percieve. The purpose of existence may not necessarily match what the capitalists and the socialists think of it. It may differ from where the United Nations has attuned the world to go in the next decades through her development programmes. It has little to do with what science or religion has postulated. It has to do with our recorgnition that our world amongst other worlds are governed by a being of higher existence far above what we can comprehend here within our small brains. We call Him God. Others have many other names for Him. We have come to an epoch in our individual and collective maturity that we must seek to know his true nature so that we do not perish driven into the ditch by ignorant leaders, systems and ideologies as we have today.

The issue of increasing same sex marriage is just one of the numerous signs that our humanity is heading in the wrong direction. It does not support the so-called bill passed by the Nigerian house or stand against it. This article will attempt to point out vividly that the system that makes it even possible for such a debate to hold as a sign that it has become rampant is due for a reassessment. There are other abnormalities in our direction of develiopment. The West call it democracy, some call it 'communism' or 'socialism'. Yet others prefer 'State religion'. The nation state system on which the United Nations came into existence protects only sovereignty of nation states, which are inanimate. Later on besieged by increasing human rights violation within these nations the United Nations organisation extended their protection to human beings but without removing their higher regard for nations and so created a paradox. In the modern world human rights is an emotional affair supported by countries that can turn the other cheek at crutial times when their own countries are involved. While the Arab spring blossomed in the Middle East America gave support but when the occupy Wall Street came in her backyard she turned the other cheek to arrest protesters.

All the contradictions that have emerged in both communist and capitalist systems of governance despite attempts by each to progress towards the other should prove to discerning observers that the world at best gropes for a direction. How can anti human values, as same sex marriage, abortion, homosexuality, difficult births, masculanisation of the feminine sex, etc, be captioned human rights and promoted? Of course, you may interject here and querry this writer: who is human? Yes, we need to redefine human again. Is it the brutalised deviant humanity of today or should we go back in history to abrace ourselves of the true human values? The truth is that the 'human beings' our civilisation has nurtured today in the name of progress cannot be described as human. To become a true human being is to be Godlike. We have moved away from the Godlike environment provided us; the Godlike values graciously made available through Customs and Traditions to each of the peoples depending on their soil and climate. We have created a gulf instead of a bridge between our Creator and us by overdeveloping our intellectual part of the brain (cerebrum) to dwarf our spiritual brain (cerebelum). To this end, we are no longer able to receive spiritual support and true guidiance and we have now veered into our own small brain thinkings and vision. Therefore, we gradually approach the 'too late' unless issues like the same sex marriage or gay marriage can pull us back to our senses to get life going right henceforth as it is willed by God.

Of course going by the definition of democracy and the rule of law as well as human rights statutes and agreements binding Nigeria with other 'civilised Worlds' it is wrong for any country to bring forth religious values into secular laws governing countries. It seen as violation of the human rights, freedom of worship, and freedom of speech etc, for a nation to determine for her citizens the sexual preference they should accept. However, no one is talking about how this law is to work in Nigeria where even basic laws lie unimplementable. That should be another story for another day. A friend of mine even went further to postulate what happens in Nigeria after the popular passage and assent to the bill.According to him, on a positive side the same sex marriage bill is one that has proved there is indeed a Nigerian culture: going by its popularity in Boko Haram and Christain camps. Is it a sign that Nigeria can live together? Whatever it will bring my friend thinks that the next sequel to this bill would be to ban women from wearing trousers and make up and maybe ban sports where men are forced to embrace each other. This is absurb view to it; I shrugged my shoulders at the direction he was going. It did not stop him from pointing out that this was one of the demands of Boko Haram, that western education was leading the world astray. I stayed quiet for a while as the meaning hit me.

On the other hand, he insisted the west had hidden agenda with their aids directed at just one narrow area: reproductive health. The uproar in condemnation of the bill and the veiled threats to stop inflow of aid money for HIV cure and prevention rings a warning bell in our ears.Does it not? So the whole direction of gay marriage policy in Africa could have been tied with HIV eradication or is there some smokescreeen in there? Why would the West be interested in promoting gay marriage here if it is not to encourage lower birth rates amongst our people, my friend pointed out? Again, I became silent! Oh, so they want us to approximate their aging population so that things can balance out or is it an acceptance that western value system has failed the West? Oh, so, Western aid: is it directed at making us more and more sterile through the promotion of rights-the right to be wrong.

Therefore, the two contending directions open to us will lead into a ditch. TheBokoHaram is looking at a future where all is hooded and marrying many wives. Where the men are overloards of their women and the children can be beggars.On the other hand the gay marriage proponents want a society where Western values can take root so that less reproduction prevail and population go down until the West can also have here as their home after spoiling their own environment. In both, there is no hope of resuccitating the old African value system and custom, there is no place for the African as sons of the soil except as refugees in their own land.

 The third way must hold promise for renaissance of the African culture as one-time leaders of the world and that can only come through a stop and think process, taking advantage of the present cleavage to reposition our true interest aligned with the will of God. The will of God for creation is an existence, which sees woman as the bridge between man and God upwards. Man works positively outwards in this coarse earth while the woman works passively inwards. Both will need each other on earth for a fulfilled existence. Both man and woman are equal but the woman stands half a step higher spiritually and so can attract a child because as a gift from above while the man will work with coarse forms here to also bring food to the table. Marriage is therefore the fulfilment of the will of God for creation and can only happen at point of spiritual maturity of man and woman. Therefore, this whole distraction about 'woman liberation' advocated in ignorance on one hand and as a reaction to the symptom of abuse of the normal order on the other hand. Like the gay marriage ban or call for gay freedom, which are only reaction to the wrong ordering of society out of ignorance or conceit, Solutions cannot come from these excercises in futility. We must go to the roots to recorgnise the true will of God iin Creation. In my search, only one man analysed these solutions as far back as 1923 in Austria . His name was Oscar Bernhardt,who published under the pen name Abdrushin his all time classic 'In the Light of Truth' THE GRAIL MESSAGE. He advocated we return to our roots and discover the grace and help that come with each soil for the true progress of each peoples

 
Mr Nworisara, a Policy and Media Consultant writes from Port Harcourt,Nigeria.