SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai Listening to The 2021 Holberg Debate on Identity Politics among Cornell West, Judith Butler, Glen Greenwald, and Simon Critchley, I am drawn to reflect on the following. As a student of a colonial language, who has taken seriously the study of the use of language as a tool for the production and instantiation of social power, I conclude that the prophetic turn to advocacy of human dignity for all cannot be achieved through the finesse inherent in the colonial turn that language embodies in the colonizing matrix. The prophetic turn demands an embrace of linguistic barb ..read more

SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai “The content of memory is a production of social history. Even when the individual attempts to give it their unique stamp, such a process never isolates the turn to sociality. That said, Modernity, while priding itself as a legitimate response to an unhealthy universalism inherent in the entrapment of the collective, in this case, it is the collective of religious imperialism, whether in the Christian West or the Islamic East, cannot escape from the social world. In fact, it produces its own form of sociality that has held the world captive today in a way that is cont ..read more

SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai The beauty of life resides in the existential process of always becoming. Nothing is. Everything is always becoming. Existence is gerundic. As gerundic beings we each are both an instantiation og the past, the present, and the unfolding future. When we use this idea to reflect on how we have constructed our understanding of God, we realize that we have made God an idol. God is not. God is gerundic. As a becoming God, God instantiates the past, present and the unfolding future, not as a moment but as a process. The God who is becoming is a God that is always relevant f ..read more

SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai Today, May 1st, 2024, the Catholic Church celebrates the Feast of Saint Joseph the Worker. It is a feast that was introduced to the Roman liturgical calendar to counter the Communist ideology of atheism that defined the culture of work in the defunct Soviet Union. While atheistic communism defined work as solely the right of humans without an appeal to God, the Feast of Saint Joseph the Worker is a counter evidence. It centers human work as a sacramental response to God’s divine grace which is mediated through human collaboration with God who works. Through the divine ..read more

SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai Loss is part of the human condition. We are each born into the world of loss. We loose the warmth of our mother’s womb when we enter into the world. Growth in life is itself existentially conditioned by loss. Each moment of growth reflects the loss of a past that we each leave behind. Leaving behind evokes existential nostalgia. Nostalgia, though can be fun, is itself saturated with the reality of loss. Growth, though is a step forward, is also saturated with the unknown. We respond to it either with hope of with fear. It is a choice that we each must make in our live ..read more

SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai. I have been playing with the idea of trying to understand why writing is a very hard hobby to have and maintain, even for those whom writing is part of their life skill. Man, I tell you, it takes a type of focus and existential alienation to embrace this skill. Yet, the content of writing demands a turn to otherness. One cannot write always without being amongst others and allowing their senses to sip all the stimuli needed for imagination to play out. While writing can be daunting, it is one of the most fulfilling experiences one can ever have in life. One wakes u ..read more

SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai Reading the recent Declaration from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, titled Dignitas Infinita, I begin by saying that it is a good document. It attempts to explain in simple language some highlights of human dignity that may be relevant for our times. The document attempts to address the contours of human dignity while also calling attention to issues that affect some persons. Issues that deprive them of the right to express their dignity in the ‘coreness’ of their humanity. This is commendable; especially as our world is faced with different hermeneutic m ..read more

(REFLECTIONS ON THE READINGS OF THE SECOND SUNDAY OF EASTER). SimonMary Asese A. Aihiokhai Second Sunday of Easter Sunday of Divine Mercy Lectionary: 44 Reading 1 Acts 4:32-35 The community of believers was of one heart and mind, and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they had everything in common. With great power the apostles bore witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great favor was accorded them all. There was no needy person among them, for those who owned property or houses would sell them, bring the proceeds of the sale, and put them at the feet of ..read more

As a theologian and a faith person, insights on faith and hope in God have become my second nature. I love it. It gives me a lens through which I can see the world and make meaning of it. But there is also another way of speaking of faith and hope in God. This one only occurs at the crossroads of life where faith and hope lack words. They embody a turn to the radicality of life. What do you do when, as a creature of language, you lack the ability to speak, or words become an alien to your psyche? At the crossroads of life, faith and hope become an embodiment of being in the world where meaning ..read more

SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai I have gotten fond of being in this little church in New England. As we celebrated the Easter Vigil last night, I noticed how little the number of parishioners were. We were less than 100 persons in this little church. But there is something beautiful about being in a small church. We were like an extended family gathered for a feast together. That was exactly what we were doing. How nice it was to hear the great ancient chants of the church being song by the choir. Like a large family, we all joined in singing. When we could not sing along, we followed with our heart ..read more