By Bamidele Johnson
The first time I came across the story of Sister Kinse Shako Annastasia, a Catholic nun recently evicted from the Congregation of Mother of Perpetual Help of the Archangels Sisters in Auchi, it was through a Facebook post by a friend, Achilleus-Chud Uchegbu.
At first, I thought it was a joke because such was uncommon. The woman had complained that priests were using nuns as recreational facilities, service providers, refreshments like bottled groundnuts or bucket meat. Dig that?
Her words were sharp, clear and brave. “Religious Sisters are not ornaments in habits. We are not commodities for priests to use at will,” she wrote. It was not just bold; it was seismic.
She gave voice to what many whisper about in corners of convents, behind drawn curtains and prayers said with trembling lips, that some priests sworn to chastity treat nuns as disposable accessories to their ministry.
My attention then strayed from her story, which felt like one more sad melody in the grand symphony of clerical silence. Only a few days ago did I learn she had been expelled, punished literally for speaking out against what appears to be unwanted clerical sexual advances or even digital or penile penetration.
The irony is heavy enough to crush a cathedral pillar. Both priests and nuns take vows of celibacy. Yet, it was her call for purity that earned her condemnation. Interestingly, there was none of the feminist outcry we saw in the Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan saga. Apparently, solidarity too has its denominations.
What the Church did to Sister Annastasia was not discipline; it was ritual suppression dressed up in holy robes. Her “crime” was not moral failure or doctrinal error but courage, the audacity to speak truth in an institution that often confuses silence for sanctity.
For that, she was stripped of her veil, expelled from her community and left to navigate life on her own while battling a spinal injury. The Church confiscated her belongings, publicly disowned her and even secured her dismissal from a teaching job at the Catholic University of Abuja. That is not correction but cruelty wearing a cassock.
The Church claimed her expulsion had nothing to do with her accusations. The congregation alleged that Sister Annastasia had abandoned the Catholic faith and converted to Islam, saying she had publicly renounced Christianity on social media and adopted a new name.
They added that she refused reconciliation and rejected community discipline. On paper, it sounded neat. In practice, it fell apart.
There is no credible proof that she became Muslim or renounced her faith. She continues to publicly identify as Catholic and has repeatedly affirmed her love for the Church. The timing of her so-called apostasy is too convenient, arriving right after her viral post about priests exploiting nuns.
It feels less like truth and more like an institutional sleight of hand, a quick rewrite of the script from abuse to apostasy. The Church found it easier to brand her a heretic than to face the mirror she held up.
The Catholic Church has rehearsed this routine for decades. In Boston in the US, Father John Geoghan molested children for years while his superiors quietly transferred him from one parish to another like a piece on a chessboard.
In France, an independent commission uncovered that over 330,000 children had been abused by clergy and Church workers across 70 years. In Chile, Father Fernando Karadima’s crimes were covered up by bishops who thought loyalty was holier than justice.
Each time the choreography was the same: protect the image, manage the scandal and suppress the truth. The Church that preaches confession became a master at concealment. Reputation first, repentance later, if at all.
It would be convenient to imagine this rot belongs only to Catholicism. The infection is ecumenical. The Church of England looked away while John Smyth QC brutalised boys in Christian camps.
The Southern Baptist Convention in the United States admitted to hundreds of unreported abuse cases, many deliberately ignored by senior clergy. Across denominations the pattern remains identical. Spiritual authority becomes a shield, hierarchy a weapon and silence the new liturgy.
At the root of these scandals lies fear dressed as obedience and hierarchy mistaken for holiness. When those in power become untouchable and those beneath are conditioned to obey, the institution itself begins to sin by habit.
The Church has long prized control over candour, but control and conscience make poor roommates. When a nun speaks up against exploitation and is met with expulsion, that is not defence of doctrine but of domination.
The price of such silence is ruinous. It is measured in broken childhoods, crushed vocations and lost faith as well as in the exile of Sister Annastasia. She was dismissed and left without support. Her only crime was to say with trembling conviction, “Enough.”
Meanwhile the Church continues its rituals. The incense still rises, the bells still chime and the faithful still kneel, many unaware of the broken spirits with which they share communion.
The Church must do better. It must protect the truth tellers, not punish them. It must comfort the wounded, not cross-examine them. It must offer restitution, not reputation management.
The Catholic Church and all faith communities must finally decide whether they wish to worship reputation or worship truth. A Church that silences its conscience cannot in good faith claim to speak for God. Not anymore.
