"Christians" Awake - Well, Sort Of

On Monday I noted that the 'progressive' Christian sites, Thinking Anglicans and Ekklesia, didn't seem to have noticed the massacre of Christians in Northern Nigeria.

Ekklesia majored on the big stories such as 'Bin Laden is part of God's family, says Bishop', or 'Archbishop to visit home of London bombers' (he was actually visiting Beeston, in which case I've also visited their home).

Late Monday Ekklesia had a new, worrying story - "Warnings of anti-Muslim violence by Christians in Nigeria". Not only that, but the warning came from Peter Akinola. Christians being killed is one thing - not really worth reporting - after all, aren't we supposed to follow Christ's example ? But this ...

In a statement, the controversial Anglican Archbishop Peter Akinola, known to many across the world for his outspoken statements about homosexuality said; "May we at this stage remind our Muslim brothers that they do not have the monopoly of violence in this nation".

"CAN may no longer be able to contain our restive youths should this ugly trend continue," said Akinola, who heads CAN.

The hideous danger posed by Christians getting cross at the slaughter of their co-religionists, evidenced in the world-wide Christian terror campaigns of recent years, is obviously of major importance.

The UK thinktank Ekklesia, is amongst those who have recently drawn attention to, and warned about the violence associated with some types of Christianity.

In a book, Consuming Passion, Ekklesia's directors Jonathan Bartley and Simon Barrow, raised questions about how some conservative church teaching about the death of Jesus could be linked to the approval of violence.

By Wednesday, "Christians" in the South had begun "revenge" attacks on entirely innocent Muslims. In contrast to the unreported deaths of Christians, this was big news - espacially as it was obviously Peter Akinola's doing.

"Christians kill Muslims following warning by Nigerian Archbishop"

Ekklesia could have mentioned that the religious divide in Nigeria is, as in Northern Ireland, primarily a tribal divide - in this case between the Christian Ibo and the Muslim Hausa.

Christians are again being killed in the North. But don't expect Ekklesia to be on the case unless they can find a way to advance their own agenda.

"Mr Akinola is also known for his opposition to allowing gays to be priests in the Anglican church."

By yesterday the site was back to business as usual.

"Archbishop compares Bush to Ugandan dictator"



Over at Thinking Anglicans, you could almost hear the chinking of teacups and the murmur of polite conversation last week. Women bishops, disinvesting in Caterpillar, Archbishop addreses WCC ... zzz ...

Suddenly in Friday, when the killings of Christians were nearly a week old, Shock, horror !

The coverage is, as always, thorough (better than Ekklesia's) and even-handed. For example, they link to the whole of Peter Akinola's statement.


But you can't help wondering. If Muslims weren't being killed, would the 50-80 Christian deaths in the North last weekend have been reported at all ?