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‘Why did you leave the Catholic Church?' I asked her.

‘The prayers were not effective,' she replied, as though describing a brand of medicine. ‘They were not
hot
.'

Religion is by far the greatest manipulator and regulator of our thoughts and behaviour. Recognising this in their own societies, British taskmasters successfully incorporated the ‘work ethic' into Christianity as a way of boosting worker productivity in the ‘dark satanic mills' of the Industrial Revolution. If only the same had occurred in Africa. Had I been a missionary or imam in nineteenth-century Nigeria, I might have adopted a similar strategy and taught Babangida and Abacha's ancestors to associate corruption with evil spirits, thus striking fear into the hearts of their thieving progeny.

Then I would have declared pounded yam to be the food of the devil, so I would never have been forced to eat it as a child.

 

The strength of Nigerian spirituality was fully brought home to me on the bus one day when another preacher-salesman stood up to promote his self-written pamphlet, entitled:
Total Formula for Victory Over the Hardships of Life
.

‘I am not hungry,' the man said, assuring us that this was no money-making scam. ‘I am a qualified university doctor,' he said. ‘I am doing it purely for my new-found love of Christ . . . You are
speaking to a former occultic general . . . the man who rejected Jeezos is now praising Jeezos today!'

I bought one of his pamphlets for
400 and flicked through it. Printed on the front page were his contact details. In order to pass himself off as a university professor, the man had incorporated the University of Lagos domain name (‘unilag') into the first half of his Yahoo e-mail address. Evidently, he was hungry. I opened a page at random, in which the ‘doctor' was discussing the causes of female infertility. I was startled to see the following statement: ‘A woman is infertile because the vagina is an elephant's ear or anus of a bird . . .'

That evening, just after the electricity cut out, I asked Mabel whether she believed in the supernatural and believed this theory about infertility and bird-anus vaginas. Scepticism must have been written all over my torch-lit face.

‘Were you there when God created the world?' she challenged pre-emptively. ‘Do you believe that God created the world?' I cowered in silence. I'd never seen her so assertive. ‘Listen,' she continued, ‘I know this guy who slept with a woman who was a prostitute or something like that. Afterwards, she told him he would never have children. And now he has trouble getting an erection.'

‘But maybe his problem is psychological,' I suggested, monitoring Mabel's swelling impatience. ‘If he believed what the woman said, then it might've affected his brain and made him impotent.' She shook her head. ‘You studied psychology, right?' I asked.

Mabel kissed her teeth. ‘I'm a Christian psychologist.'

‘What . . . so you studied Christian psychology?'

‘
No
, psychology. But I'm a Christian. I didn't agree with everything I studied. Anyway,' she placed a candle on the table, ‘these scientists don't always know what they're talking about. Science can only explain so much. You know, most of them don't believe in God,' she added disdainfully.

‘So do you also believe that a woman is infertile because her vagina has turned into the anus of a bird?' I asked.

‘It's not that her vagina is
actually
an elephant's ear or anus of a bird,' Mabel replied. ‘It looks like a vagina, but in the spirit realm it's an elephant's ear or whatever.'

She gave me an example.

‘I know this woman who's still not married even though she is pretty, has money . . . everything. She's reached a certain age but still hasn't married. It's because in the spirit realm she is a man, so when men see her they see another man. They don't ask her to marry them. They just stay as her friends . . . but she looks like a woman.'

Still not satisfied, I returned to the theme of female fertility. ‘But there are women in England who are infertile, then they go to the doctor and the condition is cured.'

Mabel impatiently agreed. ‘Yes, of
course
that happens. I'm not saying people
can't
be cured by doctors. But there are things you cannot see in the spirit world.'

Her belief in both doctors and spirits confused me. The next day I went online to research the issue of metaphors in religion. One philosopher, Sam Keen, says that religious language describes ‘a spiritual experience that transcends verifiable knowledge and is very imaginative, poetic, metaphoric and inexact'. After some thought, I could see that bird anuses and elephant ears of the spirit realm were just metaphors that were referred to in a very literal, anatomically exact, way. Perhaps the ex-occultic general on the bus wasn't as insane as I thought.

Still, I was disconcerted that people could think in such terms – metaphors can enjoy a logic all of their own. And who knows how many people actually interpret metaphors literally? If American evangelicals, with all their education and cultural sophistication, can still believe in Noah's Ark and use it to resist twenty-first-century scientific theory, I didn't rate Nigeria's chances of modernising enough to raise our living standards.

Aunty Janice and Mabel's faith was a profession in itself, in which prayer was conducted with industrious intensity. Attending church three times a week didn't always suffice – sometimes they needed to focus exclusively on the Lord for several days at a time. Prayer City was the place to do it, Aunty Janice told me, a city entirely devoted to supplication, all day every day. Mabel had recently attended the ‘Weekend Deliverance' for workers who can't make it during the week. Intrigued, I asked her to accompany me there on a visit.

Our danfo trundled along the Lagos to Ibadan highway. Lagos clung unceasingly to the road, which seemed to be secretly bending and folding in on itself like a maze, trapping us in the metropolis. Among the endless hanging laundry and signposts, I caught sight of a religious banner draped on a building. It was praising the Lord, using a Nigerian turn of phrase that's supposed to flatter but, when literally interpreted, actually spoke my mind. It read: GOD IS TOO MUCH.

Finally, the city gave way to quiet grasses. We disembarked next to a long high wall, the words PRAYER CITY painted on it in giant white letters. Prayer City is owned by the Ministry of Fire and Miracles (MFM), one of the biggest evangelical organisations. MFM, like other large churches, bought a large tract of land where adherents can stay for days on end and participate in prayerful activities. Prayer City also contains a school, a bank and a hospital, all commercially sponsored.

Mabel and I entered the City through a checkpoint that was manned by policemen, who were also ministry members. They looked me up and down, casting a censorious eye over my trousers, earrings and short-sleeved T-shirt. The MFM bans women from wearing these items. Female trousers are considered a form of ungodly transvestism, jewellery is too flashy and tight clothing is a distraction for MFM menfolk who might salivate rather than pray. The MFM guards excused my faux pas on the grounds that I was from abroad.

Mabel and I walked down a tarmac pathway that cut through quiet, sprawling acres of grass, stretching as far as the eye could see. To one side there was a large terrace filled with countless white plastic chairs. They were occupied on the weekends by thousands of worshippers talking in tongues and creating a febrile din of prayers, a unified spiritual climax.

In the distance stood several low-rise hotel buildings where visitors stay. Every social background and problem presented itself here: families wanting to resolve conflicts; young mothers whose ex-boyfriends won't accept paternity of their babies.

Mabel and I walked along streets with names like Salvation Close, past the cheap dormitories with floor mattresses, and the pricey suites for wealthier worshippers. According to Aunty Janice, any guest checking into the hotel is grilled at reception about which church group or division of MFM they belong to. The ministry doesn't want people coming to Prayer City simply to put a roof over their heads. It's called Prayer City for good reason: guests are expected to pray and fast, day and night, and the staff and security guards will make sure that they do.

‘You've come to bother God,' Aunty Janice had explained earlier in the day. ‘You don't give God any
rest
.' Prayer City's staff will ring bells along the corridors to call people to prayer, she said. If a guest spends three days at the City without praying, their stay won't be extended, and no guest can stay for longer than one month, no matter how dire their circumstances. Aunty Janice knew this from experience. Years ago, she took refuge at the City during her lowest ebb when she was penniless and homeless. She slept on the cheapest dorm mattresses and devoted her days to non-stop supplication, yet after a few weeks the ministry told her, ‘Madam, you must leave.' Such a harsh policy was designed to guard against potential thieves and the indigent hoards who might use its facilities as a permanent base.

Mabel and I strolled through the grounds, past the cybercafé, the
business centre and the restaurant. We stopped at the branch of a major bank chain to withdraw money. I was curious about what the upmarket suites looked like. The hotel receptionist was a picture of implacable hauteur: hair scraped back into a severe bun, and a neatly pressed purple skirt suit that signified an intent to stick to the rules with holy-minded relish. I had to cajole her into letting me see one of the rooms. Only guests were allowed to see them, apparently. While she kept vigil in the doorway, I peeked into the suite's spotless bathroom and surveyed the thick purple carpet in the bedroom. This accommodation was better than most in Lagos in its $70 per night price range.

Afterwards, Mabel and I walked towards Prayer City's restaurant. On the way, a man roughly the same age as me approached us. His face wore a knowing, friendly grin. Mabel rolled her eyes. ‘He
always
wants to talk to me,' she whispered. The man, Emmanuel, had been staying at Prayer City for a few weeks. His round face seemed ravaged by untold hardships, and he was clearly suffering from depression. His conversation – a stream of manic consciousness – was a predominantly one-way affair.

‘Do you like it here?' I asked him.

‘It is an advantageous environment. I feel as if I am walking on the moon . . . You live in
Jand
?' he asked (
Jand
is the slang name for ‘overseas'). ‘I want to go there. My parents were going to take me when I was five years old but we weren't able to go . . . my friend is in the US. He says he will help me get a visa. We have a business . . . we export T-shirts . . . we are music producers.'

Mabel and I nodded patiently. The three of us walked to the restaurant, a shaded outdoor area with tables and chairs and biblical Nollywood film posters lining one wall. A suspicious-looking man, sitting with idle vigilance, watched us from a corner. Perhaps he was one of the plain-clothed security guards who patrol the City to ensure that visitors are obeying the rules.

‘Do you want some food?' I asked Emmanuel as he sat with us
at a table. He declined, and leaned forward to continue talking at us while we ate rice and stew.

‘Education is very important,' he declared. ‘Did you go to university?'

‘No,' I lied, trying to avoid being roped into more conversation.

‘Me neither,' he said. ‘Getting a degree is not enough. Your degree is only 10 per cent of it . . . it won't bring you money . . . it's not like putting your card in ATM. You must try and create your own job, not sit and wait for someone to employ you.'

Emmanuel's ambitions included song production, IT management and church administration. He was sane enough to recognise the diversity of his plans. It was justified, he said. He cited a successful pastor who had gained five degrees and applied his multiple skills to running his ministry. Emmanuel's thinking flashed with occasional clarity. He was an intelligent guy suffering from a mental illness. But I felt he needed urgent medical treatment, not prayers. By staying here in Prayer City, I worried that his fundamental problems, like Nigeria's, were going unsolved.