Next year marks the 150th an­niver­sary of the ar­rival of the Holy Ghost Fa­thers in Trinidad and al­so the found­ing of St Mary's Col­lege. To cel­e­brate these two mo­men­tous oc­ca­sions, a cen­tral plan­ning com­mit­tee has been formed to plan and ex­e­cute ac­tiv­i­ties that will span a one-year pe­ri­od. The com­mit­tee, head­ed by Fr Ronald Mendes, CSSp, Prin­ci­pal of St Mary's Col­lege, has been meet­ing for the past few months and has al­ready de­vel­oped a draft pro­gramme of events. The cel­e­bra­tions have been tagged as "The Sesqui­cen­ten­ni­al An­niver­sary Cel­e­bra­tions" (the Latin equiv­a­lent of 150th) so that all of the events will be brand­ed as 'Sesqui­cen­ten­ni­al'.

The pro­gramme was launched at a me­dia con­fer­ence at Arch­bish­op's House on Thurs­day. Among those ad­dress­ing the me­dia were Arch­bish­op Har­ris (an alum­nus of St Mary's Col­lege), Fr Gre­go­ry Au­gus­tine, CSSp, Provin­cial Su­pe­ri­or of the Holy Ghost Fa­thers, and Fr Mendes. Mem­bers of the cen­tral plan­ning com­mit­tee pre­sent­ed in­for­ma­tion on the ac­tiv­i­ties planned by their re­spec­tive com­mit­tees. The mem­bers of the Cen­tral Plan­ning Com­mit­tee are: Nigel Joseph, Clive Bel­grave (pub­lic­i­ty, pub­li­ca­tions and com­mu­ni­ca­tions); Richard Joseph (fund-rais­ing); Louis Ramd­hanie (time cap­sule); Mary-Lou Am­mon (mu­se­um, archiv­ing and mem­o­ra­bil­ia); Nicole Gomes, Miguel Browne (2013 col­lege an­nu­al); Mark Bish­op and Nestor Lam­bert (events).