The Untruths of the Catholic Priests

Although a Methodist, I have always had, from my youth, a profound respect and reverence for the Roman Catholic Priests. In my native Enwang town where ignorance and superstition foisted on most of us the destructive fear of witchcraft, the young Caucasian Roman Catholic priests, who visited from time to time, were a source of spiritual solace.

They were believed to possess a "rare and special" knowledge which gave them the power to exorcise "evil spirits" from "haunted houses" or extricate their faithfuls from the spell of malevolent witch doctors. For many years, the immaculate regalia, humility, childlike sincerity and selflessness of the catholic priests were to me epitome of righteous and truly christened living. It is against this background that one can appreciate my deep sense of disappointment on reading Rev. Father Stan Chuilo's and Archbishop John Olorunfemi Onaiyekan's spurious sacerdotal diatribes against AMORC in THISDAY of September 17 and Guardian of September 24, 2000 respectively. Their pronouncements were unbecomingly slanderous. They abundantly exposed their lack of respect for other people's way of life. What was most disturbing was the palpable absence of the remotest regard for two cardinal biblical injunctions, viz.: "Thou shall not bear false testimony against thy neighbour," (Exodus 20:16), and "Thou shall not raise a false report, put not thine hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness." (Exodus 23:1), KJV.

In Rev. Chuilo's case, he opened his article entitled Secret Societies and Us by calling attention to AMORC's constructive criticism of the secret society bill currently being debated in the House of Representatives. He did not bother to articulate, in any pastoral manner, the defects in AMORC's reasoning and why he conceived that the bill in its present form cannot be used as "an instrument of persecution." For instance, AMORC had posited that the omission in the bill of the concise definition of the word cult posed a serious danger. In the absence of any statutory definition of the term cult, the Order opined that it must be assumed that the sponsors of the bill intend the standard meanings, as obtained in the English dictionaries, to be used.

A cursory check of Chambers' dictionary reveals that the word cult means "a system of religious worship, formal worship, a sect... "The same dictionary says sect means "a body of followers, a school of opinion especially in religion or philosophy, a subdivision of one of the main religious divisions of mankind." Webster's Third International dictionary (unabridged) specifically mentions Roman Catholicism which has "reverence and ceremonial veneration paid to God or to the Virgin Mary or to the Saints or to objects that symbolize or otherwise represent them" as a cult. Whether the Roman Catholic Church is eventually roped in as a cult or not, the question is: Is it conscionable to support or advocate or instigate the proscription of other people's cut, sect, or "system of religious worship," whether it is open or secret, simply because its practices, rituals and ceremonies, etc. are at variance with ours and/or in the minority? Will this not constitute a flagrant breach of the inalienable rights of our fellow citizens as entrenched in sections 38(1), 40, and 42(1) of our constitution? What wrong has AMORC done in calling our collective attention to this danger?

Instead of our reverend gentleman from the Roman Catholic Secretariat in Lagos addressing the chief issues raised by AMORC about the bill, he elected to smear the organization's integrity by fabricating all sorts of delinquent lies against it and maliciously promoting the dichotomous and inflammatory idea that since AMORC is openly critical of the bill, it is therefore, opposed to Christianity and Christian interests. How do we as a country profit from the sectarian hatred Chuilo is cultivating with this absurd illogicality? Is Rev. Father Stan Chuilo, whose church has been stridently campaigning against the introduction of Shari'ah in some Northern states in the guise that it violates the fundamental human rights of Christians in those states, telling us that the Roman Catholic Church is the actual sponsor of the secret society bill and that this bill and that this bill is designed to foster "Christian interests"? Does the "Christian interests," as conceived by them, include an abrogation of the fundamental rights of and discrimination against those with minority and divergent opinions? Will this not breach the unique gospels of "love they neighbour as thyself" and "do unto others as you will be done by" promulgated by Jesus the Christ? To demonstrate the undesirability of secret societies, Rev Chuilo told his readers that Adolf "Hitler banned all secret societies including Freemasonry, Rosicrucian Order, OTO etc," But this is being economical with the truth.

The fact is that all critical religious sects were banned. Roman Catholicism ostensibly became the state religion. Although Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini were of the Roman Catholic faith, Pope Pius XII refused to either condemn their atrocious actions or excommunicate any of them from the church. Some authorities contend that the church had to condone Hitler's heinous megalomania because the Pope had entered into "a very lucrative deal" with him whereby 8-10 per cent of the monthly income of all Christian workers in Germany was deducted at source and paid into the Papal treasury. In 1943 alone, 100 million dollars of this "Church Tax" was paid to the Vatican. Why did Rev. Father Chuilo not reveal to this readers the gospel truth that while the Roman Catholic Church was doing "lucrative business' with Mussolini and Hitler, it was Churchill, a Freemason and Roosevelt, a Rosicrucian, that joined forces to free humanity and the world from Hitler's murderous tyranny? History relates that Hitler caused the execution of 6 million Jews and the Holy Church did not say a word! Without proffering any shred of verifiable historical evidence, Rev Chuilo went further to publicize the falsehood that Chief K. U. Idiodi's statement that AMORC is a fraternal organization that highlights human civilization "cannot obscure the tainted history...and...the sordid past...of Rosicrucians."

It never fails to astonish me the ease with which some "ordained men of God" habitually concoct falsehood and twist empirical evidence just to confuse the masses. In all honesty, which, between the Rosicrucian Order, AMORC and the Roman Catholic establishment, has "a tainted history" and "a sordid past"? Let the historical facts testify. Two pious Christian sects known as the Albigenses and the Cathari lived in and around Toulouse in France in the 13th century. They were teetallers and vegetarians, they also ordained women as priestesses and strongly opposed the veneration of the cross or accepting the Roman Catholic Church as Holy. For all these "sins," Pope Innocent III declared a "crusade" against them in 1209. To execute this crusade, a Papal army was formed led by Simon de Montfort. The Papal legate was the Abbot of Citeaux, Arnaud Amalric.

As the inglorious crusade progressed, the surviving Albigenses and Cathari ran from Toulouse to Beziers and here they were trapped within the walls of the city. When the Papal army arrived and were ready for a final attack, the soldiers asked the papal legate for signs by which they could differentiate between the so-called heretics and the "good Catholics." the abbot thought for a while and ordered: "Kill them all - God will know his own."

Ita Awak is based in Calabar