Un­cer­tain that an at­tack like the fa­tal bomb­ing of church­es and ho­tels in Sri Lan­ka would ever hap­pen in T&T, mod­er­a­tor of the Pres­by­ter­ian Church Syn­od, the Rev­erend Annabell Lal­la-Ramkelawan says her flock will fol­low the World Coun­cil of Church­es (WCC) and wear black on Thurs­day in protest of the act.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia at the Pres­by­ter­ian’s East­er Pa­rade in San Fer­nan­do on Mon­day, Lal­la-Ramkelawan said the church con­demns the act and as mod­er­a­tor, she has sent her sup­port to the WCC.

On Sun­day, six sui­cide bombers set off ex­plo­sions in three church­es and ho­tels, killing 290 peo­ple and leav­ing hun­dreds in­jured. Up un­til yes­ter­day, 24 peo­ple were ar­rest­ed, how­ev­er, no ter­ror­ist group has tak­en re­spon­si­bil­i­ty.

“As the Pres­by­ter­ian Church of Trinidad and To­ba­go, we con­demn such an act on such a day as East­er when Chris­tians are at their place of wor­ship to be bombed. As a church in Trinidad, we con­demn any form of vi­o­lence that takes place in any coun­try and in the lives of any peo­ple. The Pres­by­ter­ian Church in Trinidad has joined the World Coun­cil of Church­es on Thurs­day in Black, which is a sym­bol in protest­ing vi­o­lence against oth­ers. I am hop­ing that on Thurs­day when our Syn­od meets that our mem­bers of the Syn­od would be dressed in black as our way of protest­ing any form of vi­o­lence. It is sad what took place in Sri Lan­ka.

“You know when we look at Trinidad, and the crime and vi­o­lence, we still have to say, praise the Lord that our church­es, our mosques, our tem­ples, we are not be­ing bombed as yet. But you know life is like a cir­cle. We do not know the day it will hap­pen to us. We hope and pray to have that free­dom of our wor­ship as a peo­ple, but we con­demn what hap­pened in Sri Lan­ka. It is vi­o­lence against hu­man be­ings,” Lal­la-Ramkelawan said.

She said that the church has had to take pro­tec­tive mea­sures in the past against crim­i­nals. She said that in Ch­agua­nas in the ear­ly 2000's, se­cu­ri­ty had to be em­ployed be­cause cars were be­ing stolen while mem­bers wor­shipped and some­one even stole the col­lec­tion.

In Ari­ma, pro­tec­tion was sought be­cause of the ac­tiv­i­ties that took place in the area where the church was lo­cat­ed.