My Contribution to a Beautiful Essay on Dance

Nice write up of a universal repute.

Here is my contribution  purely from a personal experience  .

Dance is necessary in our contemporary culture because

1) It is a great source of unification, integration and communality, but if not handled and experienced properly, the experience could be ephemeral or even degenerating.

2) Dance brings joy,  it is somehow an heavenly foretaste, it is synonymous to a song which calls God a God of the dance because life itself is a dance. Nature dances, creativity dances, and as written by Father Peter, if you don't dance, you are dead. Even the whole creation synchronizes and shakes to a particular rhythm.

3) Permit me to compare dance with love. I have come to cherish Eros the base of love, not only as it is understood in our contemporary society, but also as a passion for beauty, for nature, for creation, and i believe this is of necessity a beginning to the proper understanding of the nature of love and as a consequence of God. Those who have experienced agape much have known a lot about Eros.  it is like the many miracles of Christ which is a call to something higher, a higher state, a greater truth. Dance stays at the median position, it can lift up a soul to the sky  and can thrust a soul to the pit. As we live in an essentially materialistic culture in which it is far easier to succumb to gravity we must watch the way we dance. I share my own experience:

4) I watch carefully in the midst of those I would dance, if my dance is capable of cheering people up, attracting people in order to remove their pretenses, foster communality, I dance. If it in a relatively 'enlightened' space, those who have already grown truthfully out from the physical dance into the internal spiritual dance, i simply watch how i dance. But if it is in an already degraded environment, and i observe that my dance would be of utmost incapability of true affection but something that would further the degradation, or something that could even push me beneath,then i don't dance at all. These are just to say; i dance with sense. Like Eros, dance is often necessary, but also dangerous.

5)As asserted in the essay, without good music, there is no dance. I ponder and ask myself where  my passion for music has brought me. When i was a young man, i frown at dull and slow music,i preferred so much the hype type popularly known as 'alujo'. Now growth has journeyed me from a greater focus of the rhythm of the beat to that of the message of the beat. Beat is still necessary for in music, but i have traversed from 'alujo' to 'agidigbo', so has my sense of how, when and where i dance.

The Blessed Virgin and The Secular Age

We live in an entirely secularized world. The Christian world, armed with the power of faith in Christ was able to conquer the lie of the Gentiles manifested through various polytheist and hedonistic practices. But in our days , pagan practices has made an aggressive comeback. As Luigi Guissani puts it: what we have in our age is not a bad Christianity -that would have been nothing- but an unchristian, dechristianized world.

Christianity through many trials was able to christianize the pagan days, and now, albeit subtle , Christian feasts are being paganized once more.

In the dichotomy between church and state, let it be clear that the Church (which is the bulwark of truth) has got her new year, just as the Moslems have got their new year (Hijrah). I do not consider it a coincidence that the Solemnity of Mary Mother of God was set on the 1st of Jan which is the beginning of the general secular year. Thus, as children of God, it is imperative to consecrate ourselves under the mantle of our mother to lead us through the year if Christianity is to reclaim what it has lost to secularity. Mary is the terrestrial paradise, the true world through which God decided to come into our ephemeral world; this valley of tears in which humanity has been banished . So, as we still have got to journey on,let us consecrate ourselves to the bright Morning Star which is Mary to lead us forth through the year that we experience. It is in the nothingness of Mary that we shall transverse the nothiness of this age if we are to arrive into the somethiness, the truth of God. It is through this Ark of the Covenant that we shall travel safely and engage the secularity of our age without being harmed, for she is like a Tower of David that protects her children. When we journey this widely publicized new year with Mary, we shall see more and more about what the actual truth is about the beginning of the year and we shall thread each day of the year far safer and more blessed into the true year of The Lord .Happy solemnity of Mary the Mother of God and Happy new year to us who are as yet in this world but not part of the world.

The Cheese and The Pandora 's Box

Who opened the Pandora's box? Who moved the cheese?

When you live in a capitalist society, you've got to join the rat race of work and business to survive. Nothing is wrong with that, what is wrong is that the balance of making money and living real life has shifted towards money to the detriment of life .

Gone are days when having more children give parents more prestige. Have more than 3 nowadays and you'll be looked at as irresponsible.

Majority of the so-called middle class  have got to go out to join in the rat race for resources that are barely sufficient for the family.

Children's education is more and more being reduced to purely academical status.

I'm so sorry for the young of today, what have they not seen, all in the glorification of media: social media, mass media, web media,public media. Media media media, a tool for the glorification of pornography, violence & drugs.

And the leaders whoever they are seem to be loosing: harmful drugs are being declassified ,ages of consent are being lowered, even the choice of celibacy for priests & religious may soon become optional.

Today talks about abstinence have been muted, you only hear of safe sex, birth control or child prevention.

Authority stealing has been stylishly nurtured and given names which seem to lessen its impact :'defraudment', 'misappropriation ' , 'maladministration', 'nepotism', 'mitigation '- as Fela would say.

The rich simply shrug their shoulders towards the bewilderment of the poor because the poor themselves are over-desperate.

I'm sorry for that man who needs job but hasn't the right connection. Or one who feels he's entitled to success all because he's got integrity and has read almost all the motivational books .

Out there in the business world, shit happens, a lot there are who couldn't change them and end up joining them. Ask Obama .

Women disregard men of marriageable age because of cash, and cashless men would close their eyes to marriage until they 'do something' towards their cash status.

Unmarried women abound because cashless men are in excess, cashless men are in excess because the rich shrug their shoulders on the bewilderment of the poor , the rich do this because they are afraid of the 'desperation of the poor '. Resources are scarce because the rich are afraid. 

The Pandora box is opened by I know not  by who. The evils therein are like the Red Sea. Plunge in with confidence in your skills and ability and you shall die like Pharaoh and his men, refuse to plunge because of your narrow ideology and you shall be left back in Egypt.

Take the plunge in faith and prayers and you shall arrive at a safe harbour.

And except by a special mercy of God , those who live in cities and depend only on shallow faith and tepid prayers may also be at risk. Who opened the box, who moved the cheese? I don't know, but we all have a responsibility towards surviving this hullabaloo . 

AN ESSAY ABOUT THE JOURNEY BACK

AN ESSAY ABOUT THE JOURNEY BACK

During the last week, I took my family for a visit to a friend’s place. We got talking about the need to ultimately return home and invest in our roots. My friend’s wife did not agree with us, as far as she was concerned, she was done with her native town, if anything, she would rather claim as her home, the nearby megacity to her town . Ancestral town, for her has become a closed chapter with her parents.

On the contrary, I spoke passionately about digging more and more into my root. I told her about my current discovery that my ancestral families were originally not from my native town and that I intend exploring that history further down to my roots as much as I could. She couldn’t see any rationale in my motives, as far as she was concerned it was a risky, worthless and meaningless endeavour. She told me that her ancestral root was Jerusalem and that she would rather venture through the scriptures than expose herself to dangerous meaningless ventures like mine. I made to tell her that she wasn’t wrong and not totally right either for claiming Jerusalem and for exploring through the scripture, but her husband (my friend) stopped us from the discussion being too complicated for his wife.

Many people get a good grasp about the need for conquest and moving forward, but this idea of exploring the roots and repairing the past is still alien to many.

After we must have escaped from a circumference of work and friction, we immediately face an instant disgust against the necessity to return to the circle.  We normally have no motivation towards returning to that cycle of work, friction and torque. The evils on ground is easier seen when one is up, it gets magnified and exaggerated, the more our perception of these, the more our natural repugnance. That is why towns are empty and villages are void.

The reality remains  that the momentum gained from going back into the cycle and repairing the root is what propels the energy for the forward conquest and the attainment of true liberation and peace unimagined. That is the path God took: Phil: 2:1-11.

Passion about history, grace of memory, will and intellect are the energy base of our victory. Our liberation shall be incomplete if we are reluctant to go back to our roots in order  to repair and refine it. The more a man forgets his roots and would neither physically, intellectually and spiritually  repair and refine it, the more suffering is laid down for him and his posterity. Forget the land of source and it takes longer and harder to conquer the land of venture.

“He who forgets the home has a sack of suffering hung around him”- African proverb.

Of course, this journey back is not an easy task; it is the height of responsibility. Reality points to the fact that some evils perceived after an escape from a particular centrifuge are not always figments of imagination. One experiences a situation whereby one is not received both ways, whether from the area of venture or from the root backward. Ideas gained from the forward leap are often translated as pride and insolence by the source. Memory is often plagued by myths and history tilted to the advantage of the loudest and not reality, back and forth.

God Himself appeared not very successful in His root cause, but for Him it was worth the effort. He remained committed to His root; He was forever a Nazarene, perpetually a Galilean and eternally a Jew. Without walking with God, the principalities one encounters in the search for the root and attempt at liberating the past through memory, intellect and will are enough to jeopardize the journey; but of this is real mission made of: giving back to the circle of your escape. God is still a Jew, and so are we, albeit at the other end of the bridge. Going back is work, and it is absolutely impossible without love, but it is also the basis of real power and influence, it is the residence of the elders, the commitment of protagonists, and the fellowship of God’s strength. The back mission is the basis of baptism without which there is no redemption.

John’s concept of baptism came about as a result of his conviction about repairing the root and liberating the past. As far as John was capable of seeing, the beginning could only go as far as creation. Biblical narration of creation  tells us of  the land coming out from water and it was from the landmass that earth was taken to form man, thus by consequence, man , from dust, forms a generation of the sons  and daughters of water, and thus for creation to be renewed, through man whom God had originally  bequeathed all power, he must turn back to God to be cleansed and must be recreated by coming out from water in baptism which is a journey to the root .

Christ saw deeper than John, He went deeper than the adamic creation into the beginning of which no humanity had seen nor heard anything about (cast your mind back to the pre creation battle between St Michael and Lucifer before creation in which the latter was cast down). He also did this by a personal journey into a mystery of which we know not much about: He descended into hell. Christ’s descent into hell was a work, the reason for His death on Calvary; it was a journey into the spiritual of which only God was capable of winning. Man must thus, not only be baptized with water alone (which is Joanine and incomplete) but with water and the Holy Spirit through the sole journey of Christ ,he who was  born of God and he who snatched the key of death and brought about life and liberation through His death, descent into hell and resurrection. The journey is a Trinitarian mission and man must be baptised into God in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit to be saved. Such a great mystery.  Here let every tone be mute.

Baptism, whether in the Blessed Virgin, at Jordan or on Calvary, is not just a ritual, it is a journey of God and with God, and we little can perceive the depth of what it costs God. We must not take this work of His for granted. Work really costs, even God’s work, definitely God’s work. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but gain eternal life Jn 3:16.

Mediocrity reigns in our land because of our reluctance to journey back physically, intellectually and spiritually to the root of our experience and environment. In Engineering, we study both Integration and Differentiation to make us holistic designers. Even as we seek the power of His resurrection, let us accept the fellowship of His suffering. The latter is not easy for man , but it is the sole investment for self and posterity, as long as we live in the arena of time and space, we gain power, peace and freedom through work, energy , torque, friction, source, suffering, call it anything, but you know what I mean.

One man dared to make the journey , thus in Christ we already have all sins mitigated and all experiences leveraged unto His own. The journey back can be tough without Him because we enter an arena of competition for power, but with Him we have nothing to fear, believe me, we journey farther, quicker and surer with Him. Those who would not journey back seek to avoid work, but they end up labouring far more, and they return empty handed, unlike those who would take the step of faith and journey with Him. Being shallow, myopic, slothful and ignorant happens through our reluctance to liberate the root in our individual capacities; the journey which definitely needs meekness and wisdom, has growth, peace, liberation and prosperity as an assured destination.

When you arrive at the point of generating the new without throwing away the old, you arrive at the position of an elder full of wisdom. Old things breathe; don’t mortgage your future and that of your offspring.

 “Therefore every scribe who is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is a householder who brings forth out of his treasure things both new and old.”- Mt: 13:52

Keep and treasure your antiques.

Dad

Why do some of us seem to want to create a sort of cult around him?

Why would we want to make a saint out of Daddy amidst his many flaws?

Is it simply a case of 'b'aa ku l'aa d'ere' or is there something deeper?

Why would we simply not let go- as some would say- keep quiet, stop talking and let the dead be?

Its because some of us have seen that life is Ressurection and death is ascension , that to live is Christ and to die is gain.

Some of us have seen that in following through Daddy's death and memory is life and liberation for the family.

Some of us have seen that nothing changes, that Daddy is still the head of the family, linking the heavenly one with the earthly one .

Some of us have seen Daddy still as the rallying factor, now broadened, even adding up to eternity.

Some of us have noticed God's mercies , His covenant  and the positivity of things amidst Daddy's death. O death where be thy sting , o grave thy victory?

Surely there had been many deaths , and if death had known, it wouldn't have taken Christ's death as another out of the numerous crucifixions. Such we see of Daddy.

Is that death? No. Only if they had known they wouldn't have done it.

Some of us simply see our destiny tied to the events of this family and have decided to stay put, come what may.

Some of us have seen the potential of this family and have stayed positive amidst every chaos and tussles, because of the continuity of Daddy.

Some of us have seen in our midst and family the treasure to offer the church and the world.

Providence  has called us once again to the memorial of Michael Araoye Akinola, let every one rejoice in the  Lord as His mercies unfold unto us through Christ Our Lord. Amen. Saa maa yo!

ON THE EUCHARIST & SUFFERING

The dimension of our humanity and of our earthly existence is of such that, to achieve enlightenment - to 'see', to be wise, to know- it is necessary to suffer, toil, face hardships and to labour and face ordeals. 'Oju eni ma a la a ri'yonu'. I suppose this  is a consequence of the 'fall', of gravity, and as long as we are subject to the law of nature, we need to thread the 'road less travelled' to be free.

If like me, you twitch at the idea of suffering and ordeal and yet passionately desire to be wise, see and arrive at truth, the one remedy at mitigating the hazard of the journey is to labour, trust and believe in the Holy Eucharist, this occurs in active, regular and intense participation and devotion at Mass, with constant communion. Hear  it from the horse's mouth , Christ says:'labour not for the meat that perish, but that which endures to eternal life'. 

This does not mean that the trials of life are eliminated, but they are lessened ,in comparison to the truth one is aware of .

When you live in God and God lives in you, you are guided to realize what is necessary to avoid and what is important to be done, and you are assisted to do them and avoid them. The whole of creation happens as it were, as a reference to you. This struggle and revolt from one who does not know Christ or who receives Him amiss is what causes death. The war Christ would wage against evil when we believe Him starts within us and is easier dealt with with the Eucharist . Hear Him again: 'Come to Me all you who labour and are overburdened and I will give you rest'. That is truth.

Human testimony is great and the scripture is marvelous, but when you begin to eat, trust and live the Word of God made flesh and bread constantly, regularly, faithfully and trustfully, you arrive at such intense truth and enlightenment far deeper than the most intense ordeal or penance could have acquired on its own.

Heaven ! (Part 3)

(Extract from the book: "The End of the Present World and The Mysteries of The Future Life" By Father Charles Arminjon)

Man will see God face to face, but how will this vision take place? It is certain that we shall not see Him partially and dimly like distant objects, of which we cannot discern all the features, but which we see only imperfectly and on certain sides.

God is not in any place, but all spheres and places are in Him. He does not live in any time , but His eternity consists of an indivisible instant, in which all time is contained. So we shall see Him as He is in His simplicity,in His threefold personality, and in the same way as we see the face of a man in this world.

This vision will operate by an immediate impression of the divine essence in the soul with the aid of a supernatural light called the light of glory: a created quality and a supernatural virtue of the intellect, infused into the soul, which will give it the aptitude and the power to see God. This light of glory will transform man, it will deify him by imprinting in him the seal and likeness of celestial beauty, and make him the image of the Father; it will expand and augment the soul's capacity for knowledge to such an extent that it will become able to apprehend immense and boundless good.

Just as, by means of the light of the sun, the eye can see the variety of tangible things and, so to speak, comprehend the whole extent of the universe; just as, aided by the light of reason, it knows the reason for its own existence, and the intellectual truths, so immersed in the light of glory, it will have infinity as its domain, and in a sense, will comprehend God Himself.

Scripture teaches us that the light of glory is the light of God Himself.By it , our souls will be so immersed in the light of the divine presence that we may say with St Augustine, that in a sense, they will no longer know through their own knowledge, but from the very knowledge of God, and that they will no longer see with their so weak and limited eyes, but with the very eyes of God.

The transports that the divine vision will arouse in the elect will make their hearts super abound in the most unutterable joys, it will be a flood of delight and raptures, life in its inexhaustible richness and the very source of all good and all life. It will be ,as St Augustine goes on to say, like a gift from God of His own Heart, so that we may love and rejoice with all the energy of the love and joys of God Himself.

Eternal life, says St Paul, is like a weight, like being overwhelmed with all delights, all exhilaration and all transports: "an eternal weight of glory", a weight that, by reviving man, rather than annihilating him, will inexhaustibly renew his youth and vigor.  It is a source forever fertile, where the soul will drink substance and life in abundance. It is a marriage in which the soul will clasp its Creator in an eternal embrace without ever  feeling any diminution of the rapture it felt on that day when, for the first time it was united to Him and pressed Him to its bosom.

Even so, the elect who see God will not comprehend Him. God is incomprehensible to all created things.We shall see God as He is, some more, others less, according to our disposition and merits. God is in infinite, and all that can be said is that the creature sees Him; sees Him as He is, entire, and yet does not see Him, in the sense that what he succeeds in discovering of His perfections is nothing compared with what the eternal Being Himself contemplates, in the splendor of His word and in union with the Holy Spirit.

We would say that,, in comparison with God, the elect are like a traveler standing on the banks of the ocean. The traveler knows that it is the ocean, he sees with his own eyes the ocean, which stretches out and unfolds in the immensity, and he says, " I have seen the ocean". Nevertheless there are reefs and distant island she does not discern, and his gaze has not encompassed all the riverbanks and all the contours of the ocean.

Accordingly, contemplation of the ocean will not mean immobility but  above all, activity,an ever ascending progression, where movement and repose will be bound together in ineffable harmony.

But infinity has no limits, no bottom or shore. The happy mariners of that fortunate abode will never cry, like Christopher Columbus: land!land! They will say God, God always. God yet more.... Forever there will be new perfections they will seek to gain: forever more pure and more intoxicating delights aspire to taste. The infinite God has no limits, the desire which He arouses is immeasurable.

Nevertheless, the sight of the divine essence will not absorb the saints so much as to make them forget the external marvels of the visible world, or prevent their relationship with the other elect. The spirits of the elects enter into contact with the world of the spirits, they see the beauty of the blessed souls, illuminated by the divine likeness, adorned with charity and its attendant virtues, as with a nuptial robe.

Heaven is the repose of man's intellect, the repose of his will and affections.Yet what often frightens us in this life, what makes us reject heaven with a sort of repugnance, is that we imagine that in that abode, all the natural attachments of our hearts will be, as it were,annihilated and invisibly extinguished by the conquering exuberance of the love in which we shall be inflamed for the Creator.Oh! The whole of Christianity protests against this error.

What we teach as certain is that in heaven we shall see and recognize each other, and in heaven we shall love one another.

All the objects and causes that captivate our hearts and arouse love in this world will act with an intensity a thousand times greater, and without encountering any obstacle on the hearts of the elect.

In this life, love is still the consequence of gratitude, and our hearts glow at the memory of benefits and services rendered. It is only in heaven that we shall recognize the extent and the cost of the graces of every kind that our benefactors have showered on us.

Then the child will read all the treasures of grace, solicitude and tenderness enclosed in the earth of his mother. He will know that , next to God, it was the tears,prayers and sighs of that mother which brought about his salvation. O mother, now, i love you a thousand times more tenderly because of the eternal life that i have received  and without which the first would have been a fatal gift, a source of calamity and torture for me.

Then, Christian fathers  your sacrifices  courage and heroic constancy in strengthening your sons by profitable examples, and in rearing them by noble, laborious training, will no longer be unknown. We shall redeem the debt of our hearts in eternal thanksgiving.

How much greater will be our fascination, as we sit at the great hearth of our Heavenly Father,listening while our brothers tell us the story of their seductive and manifold temptations and of the assaults waged by hell over which they triumphed. We shall not tire of hearing about those victories won in the sight of God alone, more glorious than those of conquerors; those battles waged in silence against the failings of the flesh and the turmoils of one's own thoughts. We shall admire their efforts and their heroic generosity. We shall know about the twist and turns and uncertainties whereby the grace of the Spirit of God, through a strong but gentle impulse, led them to the harbor of repose, and turned even their deviations and falls to account, in the edification of their incorruptible crowns. Ah! These will be inexhaustible subjects of conversation, which will never loose their interest and charm.

It is true that the glory and happiness of the elect will be apportioned according to their merits, and that they will differ in beauty and greatness as the stars in the sky are themselves different in size and brightness. Nevertheless, union, peace and harmony will not reign any less in this countless array, in which the lesser ranks cooperate with the highest in the repose and harmony of all.

Each will be rich in the richness of all; each will trill in the happiness of all. Just as the creation of a new sun would double the fires that burn the air, so each new sun in the City of God will increase the measure of our own bliss, with all its happiness and glory.

There will no longer be any place for rivalry or envy. Each of the elect will receive the complement of his personal good from the good of his brethren.  We shall read their souls as clearly as our own. On this point St Augustine exclaims: " O happy heaven where there will be as many paradises as citizens, where glory will come to us by as many channels as there are hearts to show us their concerns and affection, where we shall possess as many kingdoms as there are monarchs sharing in our rewards.

In heaven , sin is forever excluded. The elect are no longer capable of committing the least shadow of a fault or imperfection.

For this reason the saints felt a kind of anxiety and unease amidst prosperity. They knew that , in this life, the most honourable pleasures and the sweetest and most lawful joys have always something debilitating and corrupting for the Christian soul.

However, in heaven, the bliss of glory, far from rendering souls more human, elevates them and makes them more spiritual.

Surprisingly , heaven is somehow the opposite of earth!Here below, man is restored and bathed anew in dignity and moral value through suffering and sacrifice. In heaven it is the reverse: he is perfected and deified by the flood of delight wherein he is immersed.

In heaven, happiness is stable, since the elect,confirmed in glory, are beyond all fear, the soul says : " Nothing is finished yet; i reign today  today i am in possession of my happiness, and i shall possess it as long as God remains God- forever and ever!

Illuminated by infinite clarity of the Word of God, they see the events that will be accomplished in a thousand years as clearly as those that were fulfilled a thousand centuries ago. Every moment, says St Augustine, they experience, as it were , a feeling of infinite joy. Every moment, as far as it is permitted to create beings, they absorb the power of divine virtue. Every moment, eternity makes them feel the accumulated weight of its intoxication,  its delights, and its glories.

Ah! We love power and glory; we would like to be present and give orders everywhere. Why , then , turn away from the nobility of our destiny and abandon the immortal empire God prepares for us? We love pleasures and joy; we recognize that life is unbearable if affection and joys do not mitigate its misfortunes and bitterness. Why, then, spurn the only real happiness, and desire that the source of all pleasure and joy dry up along with the present life?

Earthly goods, measured against the bliss above, no longer seem an advantage, but rather a burden and a painful tyranny. Temporal life, in comparison with eternal life, deserves not  to be called life but death. On the other had, to live in  the heavenly city, mingled with the choirs of angels, to be surrounded by a light that is not itself circumscribed, and to possess a spiritual, incorruptible flesh, is not infirmity, but royalty and abundance of life.

Let us remember that great rewards are acquired by great combats and no one shall be crowned who has not fought the good fight.

Already countless tribes, legions of apostles, prophets, martyrs and virgins, just men of every state and rank, have crossed the court of your domain. How desirable their fate is,,for they are freed from our temptations, our troubles, and our miseries!

Everything that is not Jerusalem is unfit for us. Let us ask only for the goods and peace it contains. Let us think only of heaven, let us seek only heaven, let us store up only for heaven, and let us live only for heaven.
A few moments longer, and all that must end will be no more; a few more efforts, and we shall be at the close; a few more combats, and we shall attain the crown; a few more sacrifices, and we shall be in Jerusalem, where love is always new,and where there will be no other sacrifice but praise and joy. Amen.