Nigerian Strike Will Protest Sectarian Violence

http://www.livingchurch.org/publishertlc/viewarticle.asp?ID=1759

[The Living Church] March 16, 2006--A spokesman for Archbishop Akinola repudiated suggestions the Archbishop’s earlier call for restraint was a coded message of violence.

“The Church does not believe any true worshipper can go on to kill or maim another human being out of anger. It is a pity” that some in the West “are seeing incitement,” Canon AkinTunde Popoola told The Living Church. The charge of inciting religious violence “has not been mentioned in Nigeria,” he said.

Church leaders in Nigeria shape public attitudes and debate, Canon Popoola said, asserting that Archbishop Akinola “has to sound tough as it was becoming increasingly difficult to tell the youths to turn the other ear while they see him on TV smiling and talking with the Muslim leadership. The question on the streets was, ‘are the Christians been sold out by their leadership’?”