Indeed, Corona Virus (COVID-19) is hitting us harder, making us insensitive to our plights.
Though we have reduced our complaints to the hunger and lack of effect of the virus, truth is that this ‘shit’ is re-setting us. It is setting us against us, making us to, somehow, loose our dignity, sense of reasoning, and jettisoning our core values.
Our tradition, our culture, our normal human routine, our reasoning even our experience are under attack by COVID-19.
How?
It is against our culture and tradition to ask healthy human beings to go inside and remain indoors without going to work. We are hungry, but we are not allowed to go out there to work for food.
Begging for food is not our culture and tradition, but COVID-19’s lockdown and sit at home order, the have forced and turned all of us into beggars overnight. This ‘shit’ is hitting us. It’s turning us against us.
Again, it is our culture and tradition to announce the death of our loved ones and also bury them befittingly. Even the Bible supports a proper or befitting burial for the dead, saying that it would have been better for the dead to be born dead, if such can’t get a befitting burial.
“A man might have a hundred children and live to be very old. But if he finds no satisfaction in life and doesn’t even get a decent burial, it would have been better for him to be born dead.” Ecclesiastes 6:3.
(I want to believe that the befitting or decent burial talked about here is according to what you can afford.)
But today COVID-19 has barred us from announcing the passing of our loved ones due to fear of associating such deaths to/with COVID-19.
Despite that the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has confirmed 32 deaths by COVID-19 in Nigeria, we are only aware of one burial, that of Mallam Abba Kyari. When were the other 31 bodies buried? Where were they buried? Who are their relatives. You see what COVID-19 has done to us? We have jettisoned our culture, tradition and also abandoned our dead loved ones.
This shit is making us insensitive to ourselves.
Even the church and her leaders have also abandoned the teachings of the Bible and tradition of giving or returning tithe and offerings, they have become very insensitive to economic plight, suffering and abnormal lifestyle that we all have been subjected to.
You can only pay tithe and offering from the proceeds of your labor. Today, due to COVID-19 we all have been forced to cease from our labors. Nobody is making income, from where he is expected to pay tithe and offerings to the church, but churches and their leaders are encouraging us to worship at our homes, on one hand, and on the other hand, they are asking us to pay tithe and offering to the church. How?
Where do these insensitive churches and their leaders expect us to pay the tithe and offering from, knowing that we have been at home for weeks/months now without working. Many of us are now surviving on palliatives from government and spirited individuals and organizations.
Again, you see what COVID-19 has done to the reasoning and sensibilities of Churches and their leaders. They have also lost their sense of reasoning and empathy to COVID-19. This shit has turned them against those they are supposed to care for.
What projects are these churches and their leaders executing in this time of lockdown that they are asking members to pay money. Unfortunately, many of these churches and their leaders are not even giving palliatives to their members.
“Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.” Galatians 6:7.
I don’t want to talk about the authorities and their agents enforcing the lockdown and sit at home order, they too are guilty of corrupt and bribe allegations leveled against them. They are insensitive to the plight of those who for very important and necessary reason, are out while the lockdown is still on.
Even you Mr/Mrs citizen, who is supposed to obey instructions and remain indoors, you have also lost your sensibility to COVID-19. Why are you struggling in your unreasonable attempt to frustrate the efforts and measures of the authorities against the control of spread of the virus. Why are you aiding this ‘shit’ to hit us harder?
Indeed, this ‘shit’ is hitting us harder, making us insensitive to ourselves.
I conclude with lyrics from a song I love to sing: “The King Is Coming”
“The marketplace is empty,
No more traffic in the streets,
All the builders’ tools are silent,
No more time to harvest wheat,
Busy housewives cease their labors,
In the courtroom no debate,
Work on earth is all suspended,
As the King comes thro’ the gate…”
• Enyinnaya Appolos, a journalist, writes from Isiko
Sunday, 26th April, 2020
