WORLD'S LARGEST CHURCH AUDITORIUM IN ABUJA: A MISPLACEMENT OF OUR NATIONAL PRIORITIES

By EGBEOLOWO RIDWAN

the most worrisome aspect is, when pertinent issues relating to the nation's economy are tabled on the front burner, majority of Nigerians shy away from these important issues. one would wonder if they are directly or indirectly affected by these issues or not. These are issues that matters a lot but we take them with levity as If they are not in any way important to our well-being. When a country is filled with religious houses as opposed to its ailing economy, then, it would not be a fallacy to assert that: such country is an utopian country with misplaced priorities. It should be a note of warning and consideration that am not against religion as a whole,.but when things that matters are not being attended to, then, such a country is doomed to fail. What I am wholly against is when people misplaced their priorities. If am not mistaken, and if my brain serves me well, Nigeria is now the poverty capital of the world. Even as at that,  religious houses are still surfacing in multiples, yet, majority of the people are wallowing in abject poverty. The economy crumbles on a daily basis. With all these,  we see no reason to take these issues as it ought to be taken, rather we are always at the point of discussing issues that cannot in any way better the economy, not to talk of providing job opportunities for the people. Instead, the people are being used as a tool to further the church's  ways of extorting them(The Nigerian People) through a newly established religious word called 'PASTORPRENEURSHIP'. It is yet  another slap on our faces as it would interest my readers that the so-called World's largest church auditorium would be better as a factory rather than what they called it. At least, with the humongous space embedded in it,  Nigerians in their thousands would be ready to work in a  factory as big as that. In fact, it would be another part of an industrial hub where different things can be produced for the betterment of all and sundry. But here we are, World's largest church auditorium with a hundred thousand capacity. Let's take a good look at it from this angle and have we ever for once disturbed ourselves with the following questions: If by tomorrow, all pastors were wiped out from Nigeria, is there going to be any economic implication? How many inventions would suffer discontinuity? How many researches would stop? My humble readers, I await your replies..! What a misplaced priority! Karl marx had it right when he said, "Religion is the opium of the masses". An assertion misquoted by some people. As they thought he was trying to condemned religion. Marx was not exactly against religion. For him, religion was something that "the people" created for themselves. It was "the sigh of the oppressed creature", a useful tool by which the ruling classes kept the masses supine. Here in Nigeria, we pray over every little thing yet our problems are surfacing in multiples . we pray to pass in school even when we don't read. we pray to get work even when we don't have the necessary requirements. We pray to buy private jet even when we don't have money to buy the least cars in the market. We are always at the mercy of Unmerited favors. Instead of building companies where Nigerians in their thousands would be gainfully employed, we keep building temples and all forms of religious houses with the hope that manna will fall from heaven one day. The truth of the matter is that it will not get better until we prioritized the issues on the front burner, and not some white elephant projects pioneered by the bourgeoisie to further deepened the suffering of the proletariat.