Act­ing Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo says there is much to be thank­ful for as the coun­try inch­es clos­er to re­al­i­sa­tion of the promise of re­newed ac­tiv­i­ty in every sphere of na­tion­al life.

She said so in a East­er mes­sage to the na­tion.

Fol­low­ing is the mes­sage.

Chris­tians across the coun­try and around the world to­day com­mem­o­rate East­er—the cel­e­bra­tion of Christ’s res­ur­rec­tion from the grave and of His vic­to­ry over death and, by rea­son of it, of hu­mankind’s promise of eter­nal life.

For Trinidad and To­ba­go, this year’s East­er cel­e­bra­tions are a na­tion­al res­ur­rec­tion of sorts: for the first time in two years, East­er bon­net pa­rades bright­en com­mon spaces, church­es host their full com­ple­ment of wor­ship­pers, and peo­ple re­lax with fam­i­ly and friends at restau­rants, beach­es, rivers, and oth­er pub­lic venues.

Chil­dren look for­ward to re­turn­ing to school full time in the new term, busi­ness­es have re­sumed their usu­al op­er­a­tions and peo­ple con­duct the busi­ness of life with greater op­ti­mism and con­fi­dence giv­en the de­clin­ing num­bers of COVID-19 deaths and in­fec­tions. There is there­fore much to be thank­ful for as the coun­try inch­es clos­er to re­al­iza­tion of the promise of re­newed ac­tiv­i­ty in every sphere of na­tion­al life.

That Trinidad and To­ba­go will con­quer the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic is cer­tain; the fin­ish line is at last in view. Our re­al­iza­tion of this promise how­ev­er, de­pends on the ac­tive par­tic­i­pa­tion and re­spon­si­ble co­op­er­a­tion of each and every mem­ber of the na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty. The lessons at the core of the East­er nar­ra­tive—self­less­ness, faith, com­pas­sion, obe­di­ence and hope—are rel­e­vant here. To re­main on our present tra­jec­to­ry, we must do more than mere­ly ven­er­ate those salu­tary prin­ci­ples; we must em­body and em­ploy them in our day-to-day de­ci­sions and in­ter­ac­tions. How­ev­er in­con­ve­nient or bur­den­some, we must con­tin­ue to show con­sid­er­a­tion for our fel­low cit­i­zens by wear­ing our masks, sani­tis­ing and wash­ing our hands fre­quent­ly, stay­ing home when un­well and fol­low­ing all of the re­main­ing guide­lines.

The min­istry which Christ es­tab­lished while on earth did not end with his death; the at­ti­tudes and be­hav­iours which He em­bod­ied and taught have en­dured and flour­ished to the present day. In a way not en­tire­ly dif­fer­ent from that, we would do well to em­brace those changes of at­ti­tudes and of be­hav­iours oc­ca­sioned by the Pan­dem­ic that have proven ben­e­fi­cial and pro­duc­tive to every­day life. Busi­ness­es and or­gan­i­sa­tions should keep in­no­vat­ing and trans­form­ing their ser­vice de­liv­ery to stay abreast of the ever-evolv­ing de­mands of so­ci­ety; and cit­i­zens should val­ue the in­de­scrib­able im­por­tance of spend­ing more qual­i­ty time with their loved ones.

May the lessons of East­er res­onate in your hearts and fill you with love, joy, peace and faith.

On be­half of Her Ex­cel­len­cy Paula-Mae Weekes and on my own be­half, I ex­tend to the na­tion warm wish­es for a joy­ous East­er cel­e­bra­tion.

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