“Good news”: Archbishop on Nigeria Having Highest Proportion of Catholics Attending Mass

“No wonder, America Magazine, the Jesuit Review reported that the nation with the best Catholic Mass attendance in the world could be Nigeria according to a new study published by CARA,” the Local Ordinary of Nigeria’s Abuja Archdiocese continued.

CARA researchers used data from the World Values Survey (WVS), a major international study of religious belief that has been conducted for decades, to examine 36 countries with large Catholic populations. 

Of those countries, the researchers ranked them by the percentage of self-identified Catholics who say they attend Mass weekly or more, excluding weddings, funerals, and baptisms.

In his January 29 homily, Archbishop Kaigama called on Nigerians to “seek righteousness” despite the challenges they experience. 

“Even in the face of our many hardships, we are called to seek righteousness; to be courageous enough to speak the truth and to be constant in doing good,” Archbishop Kaigama said in his homily on the fourth Sunday in Ordinary time.

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The Nigerian Catholic Archbishop added, “Let us resist every temptation to become easy tools of violence and agents of chaos.”

He underscored the need for Nigerians to be “firm in our moral convictions and our absolute dependence on God” despite the hardships in the country.

The Catholic Archbishop who started his Episcopal Ministry in April 1995 as Bishop of Nigeria’s Jalingo Diocese cautioned Nigerians against ethnic and tribal segregation.

He said, “We shouldn’t regard one another as strangers even after over 100 years of amalgamation and 62 years of national independence.”

“Our national life should be a journey marked by cooperation rather than competition, a movement from conflict to communion, from hostility to hospitality and from consumption to production,” Archbishop Kaigama said.

Reflecting on the Gospel reading of the day on Beatitudes, Archbishop Kaigama said that attending Holy Mass, building a big church or increasing pastoral areas is not enough but “we are called to reflect upon the personal qualities expected of every disciple of Christ.”

“The way that leads to holiness is the imitation of the attitudes which Jesus enumerated in the beatitudes today,” he said, and added, “The beatitudes are a road map for discipleship and the essential aspects of Christian behavior which will ultimately lead to the rewards of eternal life.”

In the Beatitudes, Archbishop Kaigama said, “Jesus reverses the human assumption that happiness lies in the pursuit of power, pleasure, fame, riches or comfort.”

He decried the killings in the country and said that God “blesses peacemakers not those skilled in the art of killing with guns, knives, bombs.”

“For those suffering discrimination, marginalization, or persecution on account of the gospel, Jesus promises a great reward in heaven,” Archbishop Kaigama said.

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He explained, “We know that some have been refused work promotion, school admission, job recruitment, appointment or certain key positions because they are Christians and some had to change their religious affiliation to get promoted.”

“I ask God to continue to fill you with strength, courage and grace to live a life of blessedness, in a country where to lie and cheat and chase monetary gain is a sport for many and to seek holiness is seen as weakness. May the beatitudes be our perfect standard of life,” the Nigerian Catholic Archbishop said January 29.

Silas Mwale Isenjia is a Kenyan journalist with a great zeal and interest for Catholic Church related communication. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Linguistics, Media and Communication from Moi University in Kenya. Silas has vast experience in the Media production industry. He currently works as a Journalist for ACI Africa.