Arch­bish­op Ja­son Gor­don is urg­ing cit­i­zens to re­ject the racism and neg­a­tiv­i­ty that is sur­fac­ing ahead of the gen­er­al elec­tion.

Speak­ing at the re­quiem mass for Pope Fran­cis, who passed away on East­er Mon­day, the arch­bish­op warned that such di­vi­sive­ness would have dis­ap­point­ed the late pon­tiff.

The ser­vice at the Cathe­dral of the Im­mac­u­late Con­cep­tion yes­ter­day was at­tend­ed by Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Kan­ga­loo, Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young, UNC Deputy Po­lit­i­cal Leader Jear­lean John, as well as for­mer Pres­i­dent An­tho­ny Car­mona, am­bas­sadors, and oth­er dig­ni­taries.

In a heart­felt trib­ute, Arch­bish­op Gor­don de­scribed Pope Fran­cis as a spir­i­tu­al men­tor and a saint who shaped his own lead­er­ship as head of the Catholic Church in T&T. But he says the con­duct of some ahead of the gen­er­al elec­tion would have deeply hurt him.

“I’ve asked my­self if Pope Fran­cis was in Trinidad and To­ba­go, what would he turn his gaze to? I think that that’s a ques­tion to con­tem­plate on this day—the last work­ing day, one might say,” he stat­ed, ac­knowl­edg­ing that the gen­er­al elec­tion will oc­cur on Mon­day.

“He cer­tain­ly would turn his gaze to racism and say, ‘No. We are broth­ers and sis­ters, all. We come on dif­fer­ent ships—as Black Stal­in would say—but we came to this one place. We might have had a dif­fer­ent trip, but we all make up one beau­ti­ful twin-is­land re­pub­lic we call Trinidad and To­ba­go. He would cer­tain­ly turn his gaze to the depth of de­spair and neg­a­tiv­i­ty that is so rife on the streets of our coun­try in the talk shows and in all the dif­fer­ent pock­ets of our coun­try where every­one is so neg­a­tive and dis­re­spect­ful to every­one else, and he would say that that is death, and we must bring the light of the res­ur­rec­tion of Je­sus Christ in­to that area of our na­tion­al dis­course,” he added.

His com­ment comes amid grow­ing po­lit­i­cal ten­sions in Trinidad and To­ba­go, as na­tion­als de­bate their par­ty pref­er­ences. With Mon­day’s gen­er­al elec­tion fast ap­proach­ing, in­ci­dents of racism, van­dal­ism, and even vi­o­lence have sur­faced—in­clud­ing a clash be­tween two op­pos­ing par­ty sup­port­ers on the cam­paign trail in To­ba­go.

In a state­ment on Wednes­day, the Arch­bish­op made an ap­peal to cit­i­zens to ex­er­cise their right to vote, amid warn­ings from Act­ing Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Ju­nior Ben­jamin about pos­si­ble threats to dis­rupt the elec­toral process.

​Mean­while, Arch­bish­op Gor­don drew a par­al­lel be­tween Pope Fran­cis and the late Arch­bish­op An­tho­ny Pan­tin, high­light­ing their pro­found in­flu­ence on his spir­i­tu­al jour­ney.

“The same way I be­lieve that An­tho­ny Pan­tin is a saint is the same way I be­lieve that Pope Fran­cis is a saint. The two men were cut from one cloth. And that’s what a re­li­gious leader of the new world looks like—deep com­pas­sion, a deep heart, no bu­reau­cra­cy and stodgi­ness but a re­al heart of Christ try­ing to do what Christ would do while we are here on earth.”

The fu­ner­al for Pope Fran­cis will be held this Sat­ur­day at St Pe­ter’s Square in Vat­i­can City, Rome.