In this interview with ’Nonye Ben-Nwankwo and Gbenro Adeoye of PUNCH newspaper,
the Catholic Archbishop of Lagos, Most Reverend Alfred Adewale Martins,
explains the position of the church on Jesus Christ and other issues
In a recent interview with Saturday PUNCH,
Pastor Chris Okotie emphatically said that the Catholic Church perverts
the gospel of Christ. He said the Catholic Church puts Mary above Jesus
Christ who should be the saviour. What do you make of this?
I believe that that kind of statement
could only have come from an ignorance of what the church believes in
and ignorance of what the Catholic Church professes. I will not like to
believe that it was an act of ill will, but
rather an act of ignorance.
For that reason, it is only appropriate that people should seek to
understand what others believe, not from their own point of view but
from the point of view of the believer. In other words, what should have
happened is to ask the church-what do you believe about Christ? What do
you believe about Mary? I think that was not done and that is why it is
difficult to draw a line between ill will and ignorance in this matter.
However for any Christian, Jesus is the saviour. Jesus is the son of
God who became man in order to save us. It is at the name of Jesus that
every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord. So
there is absolutely no question about the place and position of Jesus in
Christianity. Catholic Church being the mother church, we teach the
basic thing. So it’s absolutely beyond controversy about what the church
believes with regards to Jesus and his place in the realms of our
salvation. Without Christ, there is no salvation; he’s the way, the
truth and the light. And so there is no confusion in the minds of any
proper Christian with regards to the position of Christ. But of course,
in the Catholic Church, it is quite clear in our minds that God used
Mary as an instrument by which God would become Christ. The scriptures
have told us that she’s blessed among all humans and everyone knows that
we all regard Mary as human like you and I. Except of course that she
was given that honour which no one else had, being the mother of Jesus.
So if she’s the mother of Jesus, naturally, she deserves reverence. She
doesn’t deserve worship or adoration. God was the first person to honour
her when he said she would be the mother of Emmanuel. So if God
honoured her, it is only appropriate that we who are creatures of God
should fall in line and give her the honour that is due to her as the
mother of God. That is basically what the Catholic Church does with
regards to Mary. In fact, there is a song that we sing in the Catholic
Church that says we are honouring Mary. That is for the sake of those
who have this misconception. I’m surprised that Pastor Okotie has not
heard this before, really.
But he also said that the Pope is antichrist…
Well, he will have to explain what he
means but there is absolutely no reason why he should regard a man who
is leading the body of Christ that is spread all over the world and
giving the leadership that the whole world is looking up to at this
point in time, as an antichrist. Even the secular media declared that
this man was the man of the year, even though, he has not spent up to
one year in office. I think that should say something. Well, the pope
has said just like Paul said, that he doesn’t depend upon human
acceptance, he depends on God’s approval of him. So in the same way, the
pope’s personality, role and work do not depend on human approval but
at the same time, that humans also approve him is a testament to the
fact that he’s playing a role that he’s supposed to play both in the
church and in the world. So why he should call him an antichrist is what
I can’t understand. Again, ignorance or ill will, we do not know where
to draw the line.
So how would you describe Pastor Okotie based on what he has said?
I really don’t want to go into calling
names but I will just say it’s better not to look at the other person
with one’s own lenses but rather look at the other person from his own
position. When you try to judge people from what you personally think,
you are bound to run into errors and big time errors like the one he has
run into at this point in time.
Some people wonder why the Catholic
Church has effigies of Saints and if it’s biblical. The Bible says
people should not make graven images. So, is that not idolatry?
Again, that is a misconception of the
Catholic Church. We are aware that in the Old Testament, when the
temples were being built, they were given specific dimensions of what
the effigies, the cherubs and the seraphims should be in the temple.
That is from the same Old Testament that says Thou shall have no other
God apart from me. And apart from that, when the Israelites were going
to the promised land and they had a challenge with snakes coming to
decimate them, they were specifically asked to make an image of a burnt
serpent so that when people looked at it, they would have the presence
of God helping to cure them. In any case, the commandment does not just
say you shall have no other God apart from me, it says you shall not bow
or worship them. So it is not a question of saying you should not have
them, but your attitude towards them is what decides if you’re making
god out of them. And the Catholic Church does not look at any of these
as anything other than images and representations of persons. If anyone
now places the picture on a pedestal and begins to bow down before it,
that individual has gone beyond the commandment of God. I think people
are being mischievous by attributing that to the church. These pictures,
images and the rest of them are like memory aids. So as you are seeking
the help of God, this individual who was a human being like you but
lived in this world to a state of perfection and therefore you believe
he’s with God, is in a position to bring before God your petition. So
you look at it to remember that individual and also ask that individual
to pray for you. And that is another thing people say, that we pray to
saints or to Mary. That is not correct. We don’t pray to saints, we pray
through saints. We believe they are close to God having lived their
lives well here and therefore, it’s like saying help me put my case
across to God. It’s not true that we make gods out of statues or
something like that.
Isn’t that against the Bible that says people should pray through Jesus Christ, the son of God?
In the Church we speak of three kinds of
worship: ‘Latria’ which means the fullness of divine adoration which is
given to God and God alone. When such adoration or worship is given to
an Idol, it is called Idolatria, the Latin root of the English word
‘Idolatry.’ The second is Hyperdulia which is a special veneration
given to the Blessed Virgin Mary on account of her eminent dignity and
role in the economy of Salvation; and the third is Dulia, which is an
ordinary veneration given to the saints on account of their holiness. To
say we implore their intercession implies that we don’t pray ‘to them’
but ‘through them’. Sometimes, when a child needs something from his
father, he goes through his mother or his uncle or his father’s friends.
The saints are our friends in high places. Their spiritual solicitude
and constant prayers bring us consolation and joy. And because they have
found favour in God’s sight, we implore their intercession that we
might find favour also. This is not to say, we cannot pray to God
directly, of course, we do. More so, we Catholics end our prayers with
the expression, “through Christ Our Lord’ to indicate that our prayers
are substantially offered to God through Jesus Christ, the God made man
and High Priest who stands as the quintessential mediator between God
and man, and pleads our cause by his incarnation, death and
resurrection. The saints are not implored in the same vein. We seek
their intercession and prayers because we believe they are our brothers
and sisters whose holy and exemplary lives have won friendship with God
and a place in heaven. Hence, we need their prayers and intercession
just as we are inclined to implore the aid of a friend whose excellence
has earned respect in high places.
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