RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Planned street pa­rades, church ser­vices and ral­lies to com­mem­o­rate Spir­i­tu­al Shouter Bap­tist Lib­er­a­tion Day have all been can­celled this year be­cause of COVID-19.

But Bap­tists across the coun­try are now hop­ing to get free me­dia air time to com­mem­o­rate the day.

Dur­ing an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia, Bap­tist el­der Episko­pus Arch­bish­op Bar­bara Gray-Burke said she was hop­ing that the me­dia will al­low her the op­por­tu­ni­ty to pray for T&T.

“This is im­por­tant at a time when the coun­try and the world is fac­ing the worst pan­dem­ic in re­cent his­to­ry,” Burke said.

She ex­plained that can­celling all cel­e­bra­tions across the coun­try was manda­to­ry if T&T had to fight off the spread of COVID-19.

Burke said Bap­tists have faced per­se­cu­tion since 1917 and it was a strug­gle to fi­nal­ly gain recog­ni­tion and rights as one of T&T’s in­dige­nous re­li­gions.

How­ev­er, she said it was im­por­tant to up­hold the gov­ern­ment’s re­stric­tions.

“Yes our faith is im­por­tant but we need to obey the law. If we can­not obey the law, how can we obey God?” she said.

She said the me­dia should use air­time to com­mem­o­rate the day.

“We can send CDs with events that the Bap­tist com­mu­ni­ty held in the past. We are al­so hop­ing to get on to any sta­tion for a show so that we can pray for the na­tion,” Burke said.

Say­ing that gov­ern­ment has been do­ing a good job to keep down the spread, Burke said, “When I watch so many thou­sands af­fect­ed and so many dead. I watched Chi­na, the Unit­ed States and Iran and Italy. They are all in a bad state and we are still do­ing good. We had no deaths. I think God is watch­ing over us but we have to be re­spon­si­ble and self-quar­an­tine.”

She said peo­ple have start­ed tak­ing COVID-19 se­ri­ous.

“It is go­ing on in the right way. I be­lieve that by June or Ju­ly we will be reg­is­ter­ing no deaths. We have to keep it so and the pub­lic needs to co­op­er­ate,” she added.

Burke said she felt sor­ry for me­dia per­son­al­i­ty Ian Al­leyne who con­fessed to test­ing pos­i­tive for COVID-19.

“Maybe he didn’t know he had it and he min­gled. Poor man. I would pray for him. I heard he was cry­ing but God will spare his life. We will re­mem­ber him in prayer. All I want is for us as cit­i­zens to co­op­er­ate and let us get rid of this virus. We could make it if we try. I have faith in my Trinidad and To­ba­go,” Burke added.

Mean­while, Bish­op Shango Ke­mi from the St Michael’s Shrine in Tabaquite said the 60 mem­bers of her church will al­so stay away from cel­e­bra­tions this year.

“We de­cid­ed that we are not go­ing to do any­thing. It is too risky. The gov­ern­ment said no con­gre­gat­ing and we have to abide by this pol­i­cy,” Ke­mi said.

She added that while some church­es have flout­ed the rules, the Bap­tist com­mu­ni­ty would abide by the re­stric­tions.

“Ini­tial­ly I thought maybe a few of my spir­i­tu­al chil­dren, no more than 10 could come by me for some prayers but now I de­cid­ed not to go that way. We will not have any­body in our homes. I am plan­ning to main­tain the laws and up­hold what they say­ing be­cause when you look at the rate of in­fec­tion it is very alarm­ing,” Ke­mi added.

The Shouter Bap­tiste re­li­gion de­vel­oped among the peo­ple of African de­scent dur­ing the Nine­teenth Cen­tu­ry. From 1917 to 1951 the Spir­i­tu­al and Shouter Bap­tist faith was banned in Trinidad by the colo­nial gov­ern­ment of the day. The leg­is­la­tion to en­act this ban was called the Shouters Pro­hi­bi­tion Or­di­nance and it was passed on 16 No­vem­ber 1917. How­ev­er, this was lat­er re­pealed and un­der the Bas­deo Pan­day gov­ern­ment, the Bap­tiste com­mu­ni­ty re­ceived a pub­lic hol­i­day as well as land grants to build schools.