Faithful look into mirrored ‘coffin’ in drive against corruption

What does a coffin-shaped box and a mirror have to do with the fight against corruption?

A church in Ligega sub-location, Siaya County, thinks those two are perfect objects of communicating the gravity and personal nature of corruption to believers.

Called St Leo the Great Mban Parish, the church, led by their parish priest Fr Steve Clement Onyango, devised a “deadly” method of making believers commit to fight corruption personally.

COFFIN

Officials at the church, which is under the Catholic Archdiocese of Kisumu, recently made history by designing a coffin-like box that they placed strategically at the gates of its compound.

Christians were then asked to form two queues on both sides of the box. One at a time, adults and children alike, looked into the window-like slide of the box, only to be met by a reflection of their own faces.

The mirror had been affixed on the coffin! One would be forgiven to think this was the public viewing of a dead person.
After that viewing, the faithful took vows on their commitment to the anti-graft war.
One of the clerics who took part in organising the event is Fr Samuel Nyataya, the Catholic Justice and Peace Commission coordinator with the Catholic Archdiocese of Kisumu.

Fr Nyataya told the Sunday Nation that Catholic bishops had a set tradition but had left room for Christians to make personal pledges in the best way in their locality.

ROUTINE PROPOSALS

“It was not cast in stone that everybody had to go by the routine proposals. There was freedom to adapt,” said Fr Nyataya.

It all stemmed from an initiative by the Catholic Church launched late last year. In October 2019, the Kenya Conference of Catholic Bishops (KCCB) launched a six-month national anti-corruption campaign.

At the launch, there was also a unique rite. Aiming to lead by example, Catholic clerics led a multitude of faithful gathered at the Mary Mother of God Shrine in Subukia, Nakuru County, in a solemn exercise.

Barefoot, each with a small cross in hand and adorning a green-and-white ribbon on the lapel of their holy vestments, the men of the cloth took vows and signed pledges to fight the corruption scourge.

At the ceremony, KCCB Anti-Corruption Campaign chairman Archbishop Anthony Muheria said the commitment by the bishops was full of symbolism to demonstrate their firmness in the anti-graft war.

He said bishops walked without shoes in mourning for Kenyan society’s disregard for God’s laws and for the exploitation and abuse of the poor who are sold for a penny. In a statement, the bishops said: “We have launched the campaign by removing our shoes in solidarity with those who have suffered and continue to suffer as a result of corruption.”

PATH OF DEATH

“We make this commitment to lead the fight against corruption. We call upon every Catholic in this country to take this desired decision to fight corruption for the sake of our society,” they added.

Regarding the unique event in the Siaya church, Fr Nyataya said the action that might appear as “looking at death” in a way echoes the preaching and statement by Pope Francis while on his inaugural visit to Kenya in 2015.

In his papal address to youth at the Kasarani Stadium, the pontiff likened corruption to the “path to death”.

“Young people, corruption is not a path to life, it’s a path to death,” the Pope stated.

By looking into the mirror attached to a coffin, Fr Nyataya said, Christians were seeing a representation of what corruption is in Kenya, that it inadvertently looks like death.

“Everybody was to look inside the coffin and see the face of one of the corrupt people in Kenya. Everybody saw his or her own face. This in line with what Pope Francis said that corruption leads to death,” he said.

Describing the process as “creative awareness”, the priest urged the faithful to make it their obligation to fight corruption at home and even in their workplaces.

CLEANSING PROCESS

“A child would fail to obediently submit and account for a balance of Sh10. He soon gets used to that and develops greed for more and easily moves to Sh100 and later Sh10,000.

Now the child having grown with a dead conscience and in charge of public resources, he or she does not see anything wrong in misappropriating Sh100,000. That is how corruption is bred,” said Fr Nyataya, who also runs the Caritas department in the Archdiocese of Kisumu.

Fr Nyataya noted that through the cleansing process, the faithful, including the church, get the moral authority to fight corruption.
“The church was also looking at itself as to have battled with corruption internally, and to deal with it decisively there was a need for personal commitment from the bishops and the faithful,” he said.

After the October 2019 launch, a snowballing effect would see efforts to spread the anti-graft drive. Individual bishops conducted mini-launches in their respective dioceses with a trickle-down effect to the smallest units of parishes.

CASH DONATIONS

With the routine signature barefoot, cross-in-hand or candles in place of crosses and signing of individual pledges, one faithful after another in the Catholic Church that boasts at least seven million faithful across Kenya spread the anti-graft message to its clergy, religious and laity.

The Siaya church also no longer accepts cash contributions, instead welcoming cashless donations at fundraisers by only allowing money transfer or cheques to avoid the handling of large amounts of cash, and give a clear trail of the donors.

“We like talking about corruption but fail to walk the talk. People will only talk about the ills of corruption because they are not beneficiaries,” explains Fr Nyataya.

Of people viewing their reflection on a coffin, the priest says there is deep symbolism.

“It is a reflection of who we are! It’s scary but it’s a deterrent,” he says.