T&T, hope­ful­ly, has just come through the worst of the rav­ages of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

“But we must be alert, watch­ing the virus cau­tious­ly, be­cause of the new up­surge in Chi­na,” says Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley.

His state­ment formed part of his Good Fri­day mes­sage to the na­tion.

Fol­low­ing is an edit­ed ver­sion of the PM’s mes­sage:

I ex­tend Good Fri­day Greet­ings to all on be­half of the Gov­ern­ment of the Re­pub­lic of Trinidad and To­ba­go, my fam­i­ly, and my­self as Prime Min­is­ter.

At this time two of the world’s largest re­li­gious com­mu­ni­ties are cel­e­brat­ing holy fes­ti­vals.

Last week, you may re­call I ex­tend­ed greet­ings to the Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ty at the be­gin­ning of the month of Ra­madan, which is con­sid­ered by its mem­bers as the time in which they can search, ex­pand and deep­en their spir­i­tu­al con­nec­tions.

To­day, I ex­tend greet­ings to the Chris­t­ian com­mu­ni­ty, as its mem­bers ob­serve Good Fri­day, mark­ing the cru­ci­fix­ion and death of Je­sus Christ at Cal­vary.

This is part of Holy Week, in which the Pas­sion nar­ra­tive be­gins with Christ’s tri­umphant re­turn to Jerusalem on­to his cru­ci­fix­ion, death and even­tu­al res­ur­rec­tion on the glo­ri­ous Sun­day.

With­in that Pas­sion nar­ra­tive, there are as­pects, which I find are es­pe­cial­ly rel­e­vant in this coun­try’s present cir­cum­stance – Christ’s Agony in the Gar­den of Geth­se­mane and the Sta­tions of the Cross, or the Way of Sor­rows. There we see Je­sus be­ing test­ed, suf­fer­ing, bear­ing and en­dur­ing, even ques­tion­ing him­self -- yet dis­play­ing the virtue of pa­tience which is re­quired when one con­fronts dif­fi­cul­ties in their own life’s jour­ney. Je­sus’s agony here needs to be read and re-read, for it stands as an ex­am­ple to us all.

Trinidad and To­ba­go, hope­ful­ly, has just come through the worst of the rav­ages of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, but we must be alert, watch­ing the virus cau­tious­ly, be­cause of the new up­surge in Chi­na.

Now, we are fac­ing the con­se­quences of the war in Ukraine, which many thought ini­tial­ly would be un­re­lat­ed to our world, but that, along with the sup­ply chain cri­sis, con­tin­ues to cause world­wide shifts in food and fu­el prices which will touch every pock­et, every house­hold --- across the globe.

We in Trinidad and To­ba­go, are not im­mune, for these con­se­quences will be felt world­wide for some time to come.

We know that some of our cit­i­zens may be feel­ing at this point, down, fear­ful, stressed, ex­haust­ed and de­plet­ed, but this Good Fri­day could be that “Mo­ment” in which we can re­plen­ish our­selves, turn­ing for so­lace and hope in the spir­i­tu­al path of life, recog­nis­ing that there are good and bad, light and dark­ness and that we will get over these dif­fi­cult days.

Which one we chose, Fel­low Cit­i­zens, is all up to us, na­tion­al­ly and in­di­vid­u­al­ly.

Fel­low cit­i­zens, find some time to­day, to sur­ren­der to that stir­ring, hu­man im­pulse with­in you, say­ing some­thing pleas­ant, and be­ing kind and gen­er­ous to those around you.

Holy Good Fri­day to all cit­i­zens.