Bishop William Avenya of Nigeria in a recent statement begged for help, saying that with the persecution of Christians Nigeria is on the edge of a genocide just like what happened in Rwanda during the mid-1990s:
“PLEASE DON’T make the same mistake as was made with the genocide in Rwanda. It happened under our noses, but no one stopped it. And we know well how that ended.”
These are the words of Bishop William Amove Avenya of the Diocese of Gboko, in Benue State, Nigeria, where Christians form the majority of the population.
He is only the latest of the bishops of Nigeria’s Middle Belt to have raised his voice to denounce what is an increasingly worrying phenomenon—the attacks by Islamist Fulani herdsmen on Christians in the region. In recent days there have been new attacks in the area of Jos, the capital of Plateau State, killing more than 100 people.
The Fulani Herdsmen have herded their flocks in parts of Nigeria’s Middle Belt for centuries and there have always been occasional clashes with local peasant farmers, the majority of whom are Christians today, and whose crops were frequently trampled and even destroyed by the herdsmen’s flocks. But whereas in the past these conflicts were generally either tribal in nature or driven by economics, today they appear to be religiously motivated.
According to official data, there have been 492 victims since the beginning of the year in Benue State alone. “They are criminals and terrorists, but they do not do the same things in the majority Muslim areas,” Bishop Avenya charges, adding: “We are convinced that what is happening is an ethnic cleansing of Christians.”
Bishop Peter Iornzuul Adoboh of Katsina Ala Diocese (Benue State) and Bishop Matthew Ishaya Audu of Lafia diocese (Nassarawa State) believe that there is a “clear agenda of Islamizing the Nigerian Middle Belt,” a plan that is making use of the Fulani Herdsmen. “Their aim is to strike at the Christians,” explains Bishop Audu, “and the government is doing nothing to stop them, because President Buhari himself is a member of the Fulani tribe.”
Adding to the suspicions of complicity on the part of the government is not merely the inactivity of the federal police but also the fact that these Fulani Herdsmen are being armed with ever more sophisticated weaponry.
“At one time these pastoralists were armed only with sticks,” Bishop Avenya explains. “But now they are armed with AK-47’s—expensive weapons that they could not possibly afford. So who is supplying them? And besides, in these areas there are checkpoints every mile-and-a-half. Is it possible that armed men and their flocks of cattle could have somehow become invisible?”
On May 22, 2018, all the dioceses of Nigeria took part in a protest march, calling on the government to protect the Christians. Bishop Avenya insists: “Our faithful are being murdered or forced to live as refugees as a result of the violence. And the West continues to view the matter of the Fulani as merely an internal problem. Don’t do as you did in Rwanda; don’t wait for the genocide to happen before intervening!” (source)
The answer to the question is simple.
Recall that bishops have warned that Christianity could go extinct in Nigeria due to the persecution, while at the same time the USA is fighting a proxy war with China via such terrorist groups as in the Middle East.
The persecution of Christians is real, but as far as policy is concerned, the governments of the world are indifferent to it because there is no “economic incentive” for them.
Consider the Christians of North Korea, of which there are many and these people live in constant fear of death. There is no government on Earth that wants to help them at all, let alone the USA, and when such Christians are spoken of, it is solely for political reasons in order to draw public ire against North Korea to justify policies against that nation but for selfish reasons, not objective moral truths.
So many look at governments as the solutions to the problems of society. While governments are often times a problem, the abolition of government is neither the answer, because man will not order himself due to original sin. Government is a response to the sometimes not believed but recognized presence of disorder in the world, and without government there would be chaos with not authority to bring order when people do not want to follow right and live in an ordered way.
Government is a reflection of the people. While there are “elites” in banking and industry who direct the flow of money, ultimately they can only influence. The control they have comes from moral degeneracy, as it is an individual and even corporate quality that people have direct control over. One cannot help how much money one
It does not matter what was or was not born into, or one’s own strengths and weaknesses sometimes, but one can choose how he lives. The willingness to do what is right for the sake of what is right is something that no man can fully stop, but just attempt influence.
The reason why a government acts in a morally degenerate way is because this is how the people act, beginning at the bottom of social interactions and going to the top. The rot begins in the roots and bears its fruit at the end.
There may be many good people who care, and who do believe in what is right. But will these people do what is right? Will they support what is right regardless of the cost? Will they put aside their own interests for the greater good, even if it hurts them?
Every man has to make that choice. But as far as much of the USA is concerned, just as the Iraqi Christians what happened to them. That is, if you can find the survivors.