"Our na­tion was forged in the fires of hope and prayer." Those were the words of founder, pres­i­dent and chief ex­ec­u­tive of­fi­cer of Praise City In­ter­na­tion­al, Bish­op Dave Al­leyne dur­ing the min­istry's Day of Atone­ment cer­e­mo­ny last week. This year's theme was ti­tled En­ter­ing in­to a New Sea­son. Al­leyne lament­ed the fact that the na­tion had reached an all-time low."The deca­dence con­tin­ued as we drift­ed away from spir­i­tu­al­i­ty. Our na­tion was forged in the fires of hope and prayer and as we ne­glect these foun­da­tion­al prin­ci­ples, to­day we are pay­ing a ghast­ly price," he told the con­gre­ga­tion.

As the min­istry cel­e­brat­ed its sev­enth Day of Atone­ment, mem­bers com­mit­ted them­selves to a time of fast­ing as they af­flict­ed their souls and did in­tro­spec­tions to rid them­selves of neg­a­tiv­i­ty and non-work­ing ways.The build-up to the cer­e­mo­ny saw young and old peo­ple spend­ing all night in prayer at the church sanc­tu­ary to re­gain their stand­ing be­fore God to try to make amends for wrongs they have done by com­mis­sion and omis­sion.

The day con­clud­ed with Bish­op Al­leyne bless­ing the var­i­ous el­e­ments: wa­ter, fire, air, light, forestry and rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the var­i­ous eth­nic groups that com­prise our twin-is­land re­pub­lic. Af­ter the holy cer­e­mo­ny mem­bers were in a ju­bi­lant mood as they hugged and greet­ed each oth­er as Praise City In­ter­na­tion­al en­tered its new spir­i­tu­al year 2012.