As bombs fly in the Mid­dle East, it is im­por­tant for be­liev­ers to re­main ground­ed in faith and hope. As a stu­dent of his­to­ry, I ap­pre­ci­ate the pow­er of his­toric build­ings to re­mind us that our an­ces­tors have lived through chal­leng­ing times like the two world wars and still sur­vived to build the na­tion we have to­day.

While the Cathe­dral of the Im­mac­u­late Con­cep­tion is his­toric and has at­tained the sta­tus of a mi­nor basil­i­ca, I chose to fo­cus on oth­er ar­chi­tec­tur­al gems for this col­umn.

St Anne’s Ro­man Catholic church in Port-of-Spain cel­e­brat­ed its 175th an­niver­sary in 2019. My last vis­it to this church left me awestruck and was the in­spi­ra­tion to write this col­umn, as I am a huge fan of the 1800’s style of stonework.

The orig­i­nal build­ing was built of Tapia and tim­ber around 1844 and housed 200 peo­ple. In 1914, the St Eliz­a­beth wing was added to the south and in 1932, a north­ern wing was added, mak­ing St Anne’s church one of the few Cru­ci­form planned church­es in Trinidad.

The St Anne’s grot­to in the church yard was built in 1940 of stones hauled from the St Anne’s riv­er by parish­ioners. Stained glass was in­stalled be­tween the 1940s and 1980s, mak­ing the church in­te­ri­or an artis­tic spec­ta­cle.

The ar­chi­tec­tur­al style of the church is Goth­ic Re­vival, with the struc­ture be­ing made part­ly from Laven­tille stone and Lon­don-style stock bricks. I high­ly rec­om­mend that any fan of his­to­ry, art and ar­chi­tec­ture vis­it St Anne’s church to ap­pre­ci­ate its beau­ty.

St Anne’s church al­so es­tab­lished the first chapel for per­pet­u­al ado­ra­tion of the Eu­charist in the arch­dio­cese of Port-of-Spain in 1992, mak­ing it im­por­tant for Catholic the­o­log­i­cal his­to­ry in the na­tion.

Port-of-Spain al­so con­tains a Pres­by­ter­ian church known as St Anne’s Church of Scot­land, which is lo­cat­ed at Char­lotte Street. St Anne’s Church of Scot­land was built in 1854. St Anne’s Church of Scot­land is an im­pres­sive piece of ar­chi­tec­ture and stonework, but it re­mains ar­tis­ti­cal­ly re­strained, re­flect­ing the con­ser­v­a­tive na­ture of 1800’s Pres­by­ter­ian ec­cle­si­ol­o­gy and the­ol­o­gy. I am told there is at least one stained glass memo­r­i­al win­dow, mak­ing the build­ing an im­por­tant his­tor­i­cal site.

It would be re­miss of me not to high­light the main church of my home­town, Ari­ma, San­ta Rosa Ro­man Catholic Church. San­ta Rosa is one of the most cul­tur­al­ly sig­nif­i­cant sites in Trinidad due to its con­nec­tion with the First Peo­ples.

Es­tab­lished in 1786, the San­ta Rosa was found­ed as a Span­ish mis­sion to serve the in­dige­nous peo­ple who were re­set­tled in Ari­ma from oth­er parts of the is­land. As a lo­cal, I have heard sto­ries of there be­ing un­der­ground tun­nels that the priests would have hid­den in when Nepuyo Kali­na­go (Carib) war­riors would de­scend from the hills of the North­ern Range to at­tack the Span­ish colonists.

Every Au­gust, the church is the cen­tre­piece of the San­ta Rosa Fes­ti­val. It is a unique blend of Catholic tra­di­tion and First Peo­ples’ rit­u­als, fea­tur­ing a pro­ces­sion of the stat­ue of San­ta Rosa that has been held for over 230 years.

San­ta Rosa, al­so known as St Rose of Li­ma, holds a piv­otal place in Ari­ma as a bridge be­tween Catholic tra­di­tion and In­dige­nous iden­ti­ty. Saint Rose was the first per­son born in the New World (the Amer­i­c­as) who be­came canon­ised as a saint in 1671.

Saint Rose, whose re­al name was Is­abel Flo­res de Oli­va, was born in Li­ma, Pe­ru. De­spite this non-Trinida­di­an ori­gin, the First Peo­ples of Trinidad adopt­ed her as their pa­troness fol­low­ing a lo­calised mir­a­cle. Leg­end tells of in­dige­nous hunters who en­coun­tered a mys­te­ri­ous, beau­ti­ful woman in the Pin­to for­est; when she van­ished, they found a small stat­ue of St Rose in her place.

In her home­town of Li­ma, Saint Rose was cred­it­ed with sev­er­al mir­a­cles dur­ing her life, in­clud­ing heal­ing the sick, grow­ing ros­es mirac­u­lous­ly overnight and caus­ing a storm to ap­pear that drove away pi­rate ships.

The San­ta Rosa church build­ing fea­tures sev­er­al ex­quis­ite stained glass win­dows de­pict­ing the apos­tles Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, which sur­round a main “Ju­bilee” win­dow be­hind the al­tar.

The Susamachar Pres­by­ter­ian Church in San Fer­nan­do is one of the most his­tor­i­cal­ly sig­nif­i­cant Pres­by­ter­ian in­sti­tu­tions in South Trinidad. Its ori­gins date to Feb­ru­ary 20, 1871, when Cana­di­an mis­sion­ary Ken­neth J. Grant be­gan con­duct­ing ser­vices and a school in the Old The­atre at Toll­gate.

A first church build­ing was lat­er con­struct­ed and ded­i­cat­ed on Ju­ly 7, 1872. As the con­gre­ga­tion ex­pand­ed, a larg­er struc­ture was re­quired, and a new church on Carib Street was com­plet­ed and ded­i­cat­ed on May 27, 1932. For more than a cen­tu­ry, Susamachar has re­mained a cen­tre of Pres­by­ter­ian wor­ship and com­mu­ni­ty life in South Trinidad.

In clos­ing, T&T has some unique­ly his­tor­i­cal and beau­ti­ful church­es. As T&T pro­motes it­self as a tourism and cul­tur­al hub, the Min­istry of Tourism should as­sist in or­gan­is­ing tours of these church­es. The San­ta Rosa fes­ti­val in Ari­ma, in par­tic­u­lar, has a unique fu­sion of in­dige­nous cul­ture that ought to be ap­peal­ing to tourists world­wide.