President of the Africa West Area of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Gifford Nielsen, has charged Christians and adherents of other faiths to abide by what is right by doing what their holy book dictates.
He spoke while fielding questions from journalists on homo-sexuality in Abuja.
According to him, “We have a lot of social issues going on. In 1995, our prophet saw the future, and saw what was going on, so they put together a document about the family, the proclamation to the world and said here’s our beliefs.
“In that document, we believe that marriage is between a man and a woman. And that the family is essential to the creator’s plan to the eternal destiny of His children. We believe in families with a husband and a wife who have children, who are sealed together for time and eternity.
“Our message is to say we respect all of heavenly father’s sons and daughters, we believe that God’s law is God’s law.
To us it’s all about obedience, everyone of us, are on our own personal journey to be obedient to God’s laws. So whatever situation you are in, we invite you to be obedient.
“If you have the tendencies of homo-sexuality or you don’t, be obedient. You know what is right and wrong, choose the right, don’t choose the wrong. The wrong is always going to give you pain and agony, always choose the right.”
On the significance of the message, Nielsen said, “It’s a message of hope in a hopeless world. We have a lot of interesting things going on in the world, there’s a way to find peace, joy and happiness and we believe that is through our saviour Jesus Christ.
“We know that this world will always be an interesting world, there’s conflict everywhere, and what we are trying to teach and bear testimony of, is that there’s peace and joy that can come through understanding and knowing Jesus Christ and having Him help us.
“We respect everyone else’s beliefs and we have tremendous friends in other faiths. We invite everybody to come closer to God and then continue to ask questions and find answers to life’s most important questions.”
On his part, corps assistant, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), Usman Haruna Usman, emphasised the need for both Christians and Muslims to come together and build peace in Nigeria.
Usman, who represented the chief imam of FCT Command of NSCDC, said, “In Nigeria, Muslims and Christians should come together, most especially in programmes like these. Both Muslims and Christians can invite each other to attend their programmes. So that we both can understand each other’s religion, just for the sake of building peace. We are all serving one God.”
