Tribute to a Saint

It is good that we, ordinary mortals, do not make Saints. Otherwise, there will be so many types of Saints by all kinds of people that the concept will, in itself, lose its meaning and worth. If we, however, each could make his or her own Saint, I would nominate Sir Innocent Ofor as one of mine.

Why is it that death has always defied, continues to defy and, in the foreseeable future, seems determined to defy, all human logic, all human effort, all human science and technology and all human desires and wishes? Only God knows the answer. Left to us, or to most of us, however, we wish we never have to die, because, in one example, it is only in dying that people, like Sir Innocent Ofor, Udeora, who we wish never to die, are taken away from us.

My knowledge of, and contact with, Innocent Ofor began in the early 1950s when my parents, on retirement from public service, to make sure we grew up knowing the traditions, customs and manners of our people, sent us home to Umuchu to continue our primary school education there.

The Innocent Ofor that I saw belonged to what I may call the golden generation of idealistic, competent, knowledgeable and hardworking youths from Umuchu, Achina, Akpo, Amesi, Enugu Umuonyia and Umuomaku, who, in the 1950s, typified what was best in both the newly popular Western education and the equally beautiful traditions of our area.

To talk about Sir Innocent Ofor, where do I start and where do I stop?

1.     ‘Then he said, “Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak again but this once. Suppose ten are found there.” He answered, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.” (Genesis 18; 32, RSV)’

Was it not Sir Innocent Ofor’s life to continue to plead to the Lord for others and at the same time be one of the ten?

2. If you can keep your head when all about you

  Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

  But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

  Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

  And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

  If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

  And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

  Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

  And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

 (First two verses of IF by Rudyard Kipling, 1895)

What illustrates Sir Innocent Ofor’s life better than these?

3. I know you are sad, that you feel his loss in your lives and that you may be overwhelmed by the very big shoes he left behind. But I plead with you, Gerry, and with all the members of your family, to bear the following earthly and heavenly considerations in mind and to be assured that your father is one of the elect:

 “And I applied my mind to seek and search out by wisdom all that is done under heaven; it is an unhappy business that God has given to the sons of men to be busy with. I have seen everything that is done under the sun; and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind. (Ecclesiastes 1; 13, RSV)

 “Then I said to myself, ‘What befalls the fool will befall me also; why then have I been so very wise?’  And I said to myself that this also is vanity”. (Ecclesiastes 2; 15, RSV).

 “For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. (2 Corinthians 5; 1, RSV).

 “Then the King will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world’.” (Matthew 25; 34, RSV)

 “But as it is written, ‘What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him’.” (1 Corinthians 2; 9, RSV).

4.  Please pray for him and to him to pray for us all before the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

 May his soul rest in peace.

 Benedict Nnolim, FNSChE, FNSE,

Professor of Chemical Engineering (rtd).

London, UK

His Lordship, Bishop Anthony Okonkwo Gbuji, then Bishop of Enugu Diocese, being presented with a plaque after his induction as a 4th Degree KSM. Bro Ofor, on the right of His Lordship, looks on.

His Lordship, Bishop Anthony Okonkwo Gbuji, then Bishop of Enugu Diocese, displaying the plaque presented to him after his induction as a 4th Degree KSM. You can see Bro Ofor, far left as you look at the picture, applauding.