Cries from the Bloodied Earth: A Nation Bleeds While the Church Looks the Other Way [by Toluwalogo Agboola]

 

The blood-soaked soil of Benue continues to testify, yet the sanctuaries of the nation remain untouched by the sound of its sorrow. While communities in Nigeria's North Central region weep over fresh graves, many church leaders are preparing sermon series on prosperity, faith, and divine elevation. The disparity between the suffering of the people and the posture of the Church is now too wide to ignore.

Unrelenting attacks in Benue have left families shattered, futures truncated, and a people begging for safety. Despite the frequency and brutality of these assaults, a consistent, unified, and prophetic voice from the Church has been conspicuously absent. The Nigerian Church, long regarded as the moral compass of the nation, now stands accused—not of complicity in the bloodshed, but of a more damning offense: indifference.

The killings are no longer isolated events. They have become a pattern. Communities once bustling with life have become ghost towns. Survivors speak of midnight raids, of entire households wiped out in minutes. Yet as these reports surface, so do promotional materials for church conferences themed around breakthrough, increase, and divine turnaround—promises that seem cruelly distant from the horrors unfolding in Benue.

It is not that the Church lacks influence. Far from it. Nigerian pastors dine with presidents, speak at national events, and command enormous media presence. But with great access has come a troubling silence. Not a holy silence steeped in grief or prayer, but a disengaged one—detached from the suffering of the people they are called to shepherd.

This silence has sparked outrage among a growing number of believers who believe the Church has forsaken its prophetic role. A recent open letter by preacher Toluwalogo Agboola, titled "The Blood of Benue and the Silence of the Church," has gone viral across Christian social media spaces. In it, Agboola laments the Church’s obsession with influence and image, charging that the nation’s crisis is as much spiritual as it is political.

His words cut deep: “The ground is soaked again not with rain, but with blood. The children of Benue cry, but the pulpits echo with laughter… We cannot call ourselves ministers and ignore a massacre.”

Such sentiments echo what many ordinary Christians feel but dare not say. There is growing unease that the Nigerian Church, once a bastion of social justice during military regimes, has traded its mantle for money, its fire for fame, and its burden for branding.

Many point to biblical precedents to highlight what is missing. In ancient times, prophets wept with their people, priests interceded, and national sin provoked communal repentance. Today, blood flows, and the response is muted. The cry for judgment from the ground is met not with sackcloth and ashes but with strategic silence and polished optics.

Clergy known for bold political commentary during elections now avoid speaking on massacres that offer no safe ideological ground. Churches that once hosted vigils for the nation now organize glittering services where suffering is filtered out of the liturgy. It is not a lack of theology, but a crisis of alignment.

Agboola’s indictment is more than a sermon; it is a reckoning. He writes, “We cannot curse the kings while blessing their altars… The nation is bleeding because the Church is compromised.” These are heavy accusations, but they are resonating with many across the country.

As the victims of Benue continue to bury their dead, the weight of responsibility bears down on a Church that can no longer plead ignorance. There is no neutrality in moments of national trauma. To remain silent is to be complicit. To ignore the blood is to stain the altar.

A reckoning is near, both for the land and for those who claim spiritual authority over it. The scriptures are clear: “Shall I not judge for these things?” says the LORD.

Now the question is no longer just about political leadership or tribal conflict. It is about the soul of the Church. Will it find its voice again? Will it trade popularity for prophecy, influence for intercession?

Time, and truth, will tell.

From a Preacher in This Nation, Toluwalogo Agboola