How I lost my religion (as a Nigerian)

A Nigerian and religion are like a Siamese twin, one inseparable from the other. In a country of over 200+ million citizens, more than 80% identify as members of one religious group or the other. Most religion inclusive of the ones practiced by Nigerians preach the tenets of brotherly love, truth, justice, godliness, and general humanity to one another.

Knowing all this makes me and some others like me to wonder, why Nigeria is in such a sorry state as it is today and getting worse, it's citizens fleeing en masse to other nations far and near, death, destruction, corruption, ritual killings, jungle justice, mob killings, violent robberies, nepotism and other vices too numerous to mention being the order of the day.

And the irony is that all this vices are perpetuated by the same people who practice one or the other religions found in Nigeria.

Religion, be it Christianity, Islam or traditional religion, all found in Nigeria, can be argued for positively, they give people hope, a chance to connect to a higher belief, something to look forward to in death and the afterlife, not forgetting too about teaching it's adherents to be better people. But most Nigerians are far from better people, there are a number of good people yes but many others are not. A nation and it's leaders are only a reflection of it's people.

Nigerians spend a large chunk of their lives and valuable time praying, praying for things that can be done themselves, praying for a long life, good health, prosperity, a better tomorrow, passing exams and many other frivolous reasons, reasons that can be fixed by a system that simply works.

For example, despite the rampant daily prayers for long life, in a country such as Nigeria that any and many things can certainly kill you, Nigeria still has one of the lowest life expectancy in the world or atleast for a country not at war. As I previously mentioned here, Nigerians die for the simplest and most inane of reasons.

Compared to a largely atheist country such as China, in which the system and a lot works as it should, where people don't pray for long life, having a life expectancy of 76 years on average compared to that of Nigeria at 53 years. 

A lot can certainly be said about the manner a lot of Nigerians practice their religion, mainly boiling down to a crowd mentality, eye service and a colonial mindset which they're unable to drop. 

Nigerians certainly enjoy building religious places of worship and praying, instead of schools, industries, orphanages etc, while also lacking basic human necessities such as good roads, electricity, clean water, good medical facilities and not only just building them but building them to be among the biggest and best in the world, while millions of it's citizens are unemployed, millions of it's children out of school too. 

One certainly wonders at times if the black man is cursed or has something fundamentally wrong with him based on the way he reasons, acts and all. We train our children too to believe in a God and afterlife we've no proof of and also very focused on it, abandoning our current existence and still turn around to complain and pray, if prayers did work Nigeria definitely would be a world superpower in the league of the US, China and Russia. 

Hardly will you find the leaders of the different religious groups speaking up against the government or a system that is nothing to write home about, instead they accumulate and flaunt wealth as a sign that they're blessed and you too can become blessed if you become more religious, only speaking up when their interests and pockets are threatened. 

Even amongst the religious sects you find different many other sects, each squabbling with the other, all for each personal interests.

One of the main grudges I've with religion as practiced in Nigeria is the complacency it fosters among it's members, that keep hoping, praying, become more religious and things will turn out well eventually, instead of fighting and speaking up for ones right, instead no leave it up to God or any other higher power.

Nigeria is continually going down the drain in every possible positive index and yet it's citizens are becoming more religious, building bigger and more exquisite places of worship, one can only watch and wait to see where it all leads. 

D.N.A