Of Priesthood, Discipline, and Nigerian Youth

(By Immanuel James Ibe-Anyanwu) - Yet another young man is soon to become a priest. A beckoning masculinity, his looks are bested only by his brilliance. You joined the seminary as a teenager, I say to him—perhaps age has now brought clarity upon the enormity of this vow—do you sometimes fear you may regret? 

Not all all, he emphasizes. 

You mean you don't get...tantalized by...you know, sex, money...and other famous vanities of the human experience? 

Discipline is all you need, my brother. All you need to live just as happy as anyone else, comes the paraphrased response.

There was that lady I once saw in a friend's compound. Modest dressing, yet her beauty just couldn't keep itself in one place, helpless in its capacity for decent invitation. Seeing my lip-sucking smile betray interest in romantic, if not erotic pursuit, my friend cut in quickly: She be Sister o!

Wait, you mean this cuuute lady went to the convent by herself, with her own two legs? 

No, she carried her legs on her head and went.

I was to learn that, every year, there are actually more applications than there are spaces in both celibate vocations in the Catholic Church. They are 'oversubscribed', which means that while the world is wildly obsessed with sex, there are people lacking the relish for a more total existence.

Day My Father Asked Me to Join the Priesthood

(By Adesegun Damazio) - I remember the day my Father mysteriously asked me, "why don't you become a Reverend Father?"

He was driving at about the time he popped the question and I must confess, I became constipated afterwards. The silence that followed the question was at the very least deafening. This was a man whom only few minutes earlier, had advised me to be careful with the kind of girls I associated with but there he was speaking another language entirely.

I was 15 or thereabout but my whole life began to flash before my eyes. I started thinking about the children I never had. Then came the thoughts of an imaginary wife, though I was still as single as a needle. I looked at my Father again as though I meant to say "how could you do this to me?" He knew he'd punctured a vein but he pushed further.

"I've been thinking about it.......maybe next weekend.......so that we'll go and make enquiries about seminaries and......"