Some Pastors Have Altered and Killed Our Culture – Prof Avea
Professor Ephraim Avea Nsoh, a former Principal of the College of Ghanaian Languages Education in the Central Region, has expressed concern about some Pastors who infiltrate foreign cultures into the Farefari tradition in the messages they preached to their congregations.
He said some men of God regarded the core values of people’s traditions including their way of dressing, funeral rites, traditional foods among others as deeds that God frowned on, and insisted that the traditions of the people, especially the Farefaris must not be altered in anyway.
The Linguistics Professor said this in an interview with Word News on the side-line of a ceremony dubbed “Freshers welcoming day,” meant to usher in first year Gurune students into the Gur-Gonja Department of the College.
He said the traditional way of burial which they inherited from their forefathers were taken over by some men of God, and observed that unfamiliar shaped graves were common sights in some houses to the neglect of the traditionally shaped graves they inherited from their grandfathers.
Professor Nsoh further described as alien, the practice where rice was prepared to perform funeral rites in the Farefari culture, instead of the locally prepared bambara beans and beans cakes.
“I don’t understand why in performing a relative’s funeral, men of God would say they should cook rice for the funeral rites, which is not our tradition,” the Professor, who is also a former Upper East Regional Minister, said.
He blamed the present generation for failing to pass down the culture of their ancestors to their children who would become the next generation, and allowed some men of God to influence them with practices that were contrary to their laid down cultural practices.
“We are refusing to pass down the culture our ancestors passed onto our generation,” he said, and challenged the fresh students to take up the responsibility as future leaders to ensure their cultures and traditions were upheld and passed onto generations unborn.
Mr James Abaabila Azure, the Vice Dean of Students Affairs at the University of Education, Winneba, encouraged the freshers and students at the Senior High School level not to hesitate to study the Gurune language in the University.
He said the study of the language could open job opportunities for them, and debunked claims among some students that people who studied Ghanaian languages, especially Gurune, could not be absorbed into the job market.
Source: mywordfmonline.com/Gaspard