To­day, Good Fri­day in the Chris­t­ian re­li­gion, sym­bol­is­es what is con­sid­ered in bib­li­cal terms to be one of the great­est acts of love known to mankind by Je­sus Christ, when he freely gave his own life to save man from the in­evitable death with­out the sav­ing grace of God through eter­nal sal­va­tion.

While to­day’s cel­e­bra­tions are par­tic­u­lar­ly Chris­t­ian, this East­er sea­son is shared in this coun­try and else­where with Mus­lims all over the world who en­gage in the feast of Ra­madan, when mem­bers of the faith fast and en­gage in com­mu­nal wor­ship to demon­strate to­geth­er­ness and en­hance their spir­i­tu­al de­vel­op­ment.

There is no bet­ter time than the present for be­liev­ers of these two ma­jor faiths to come to­geth­er in spir­it and truth to up­hold in prayer the na­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go, which has ac­com­mo­dat­ed wor­ship­pers of the ma­jor re­li­gions and faiths in one small space, notwith­stand­ing their dif­fer­ences of views on the Almighty and the eter­ni­ty, and do so in peace and good­will to all.

It is a har­mon­is­ing of ob­jec­tives which we do not ful­ly ap­pre­ci­ate, un­til we look out­side and see the bloody and long-last­ing wars which have been fought and con­tin­ue to be en­gaged in be­tween and amongst per­sons of dif­fer­ing re­li­gious be­liefs.

The fact is that the in­hu­mane bru­tal­i­ty vis­it­ed up­on be­liev­ers in those na­tions, be­tween and amongst even rel­a­tives, fam­i­lies sworn to love each oth­er, and with­in the fold of how the State and oth­er in­sti­tu­tions of sig­nif­i­cance treat cit­i­zens, is at times un­be­liev­able.

Par­tic­u­lar­ly at this point, when var­i­ous parts of the world are over­flow­ing with anger and hate, the vis­i­ta­tion of unimag­in­able cru­el­ty, hu­man be­ings against hu­man be­ings, we must con­sid­er our­selves blessed here on this Good Fri­day and in this pe­ri­od of Ra­madan, co-ex­ist­ing and ac­knowl­edg­ing the dif­fer­ences in our re­li­gious be­liefs.

So too we re­mem­ber that the Shouter, Spir­i­tu­al and Or­isha Bap­tists, pre­vi­ous­ly os­tracised and dis­crim­i­nat­ed against for their faiths and re­li­gious prac­tices, al­so have their day of re­mem­brance in cel­e­bra­tion of free­dom from that yoke of the past to­mor­row.

Specif­i­cal­ly, with re­gard to the Good Fri­day of the Chris­t­ian be­lief, it is an op­por­tune time in this most im­por­tant event on the Chris­t­ian cal­en­dar, to pray for and act out with love, for­give­ness and tol­er­ance of one an­oth­er.

It is a time more so for Chris­tians, Mus­lims, Hin­dus, the in­dige­nous Bap­tists and all oth­er faiths who call out to their gods, to con­sid­er those out­side of the fold of not on­ly re­li­gious be­liefs, but from the civ­il so­ci­ety. Mem­bers of the priv­i­leged of so­ci­ety must al­so make it a pe­ri­od when they reach across the so­cial, eco­nom­ic, re­li­gious and hu­man di­vide to those not so for­tu­nate and those who seethe with anger and hos­til­i­ty to do so with un­der­stand­ing.

The be­liev­ers of all the Chris­t­ian faiths and those who be­long to Is­lam can lead the coun­try for­ward not mere­ly with ges­tures of kind­ness, the wav­ing of the palm branch­es, the cel­e­bra­tions and the grants to the poor, but can al­so ex­ter­nalise the be­liefs they hold to the na­tion.