Anglican priest Canon Knolly Clarke says family life is crucial to child development and formation.He said the prevalence of abuse and violence started in the home and that parents should stop being "parents from afar."Clarke said religious leaders were blessed with the opportunity to play an instrumental role in a child's life until adulthood.Quoting an Ashanti proverb, Clarke said: "The ruin of a nation begins in the home."Clarke, who is first vice-president of the Inter-Religious Organisation (IRO), spoke in the absence of IRO president Emrol Gould yesterday at the opening session of the third Meeting of the Caribbean Inter-Religious Network training workshop on the guide-"From Commitment to Action: What religious communities can do to eliminate violence against children?" The second session ends today at Archbishop's House, Maraval Road, St Clair.The workshop was hosted in collaboration with the organisation of Religions for Peace Latin America and the Caribbean and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and in co-operation with the IRO.Clarke said: "As we talk about abuse of children and the challenges that children are facing at this particular time, we must recognise that...if our religions are really going to take serious their contributions in shaping and fashioning the lives of children and a society then they must begin in the home."
Several leaders of religious co-ordination bodies and national inter-religious councils in the region are in Trinidad for the workshop.Among those who addressed the participants were head of T&T's UNICEF office Augustine Agu, deputy programme manager for education, Caricom Patricia McPherson and acting president of the Senate Lyndira Oudit.Clarke said: "I hope in these two days that we will be able to deal with that whole aspect of family life because family life is the crucible of societal development and religions...we have the greatest opportunity and so we must really take advantage of God's opportunity because we have to bless them as young children, we have to perform weddings, we have to perform so many activities in the journey of a child to adulthood."We as pastors, imams, pundits and other religious leaders...we do have a God-given opportunity, a God-given responsibility to shape and fashion family life and above all the centre of family–the formation of our children."