All across T&T to­day, with joy­ous bell ring­ing, singing and danc­ing, Spir­i­tu­al Bap­tists will cel­e­brate their hard-won free­dom to wor­ship.

De­fined by a dis­tinc­tive litur­gy and be­liefs rich with sounds and move­ments in­spired by the rhythms of Africa and Chris­t­ian tra­di­tions, this syn­cret­ic in­dige­nous Caribbean re­li­gion was once mis­un­der­stood and sub­ject­ed to stig­ma and dis­crim­i­na­tion.

It was on­ly through the ef­forts of ear­ly lead­ers of the faith, who coura­geous­ly lob­bied the au­thor­i­ties to re­gain their right to wor­ship, that Spir­i­tu­al Bap­tists now freely prac­tise their re­li­gion with­out fear of ha­rass­ment and pros­e­cu­tion.

In the 73 years since the re­peal of the Shouters’ Pro­hi­bi­tion Or­di­nance, Spir­i­tu­al Bap­tists have im­pact­ed T&T cul­ture, so­cial de­vel­op­ment and pol­i­tics. Mem­bers of the faith have at­tained po­si­tions of lead­er­ship and in­flu­ence in var­i­ous spheres and their places of wor­ship are part of the T&T land­scape.

A land­mark mo­ment for the faith oc­curred 28 years ago when, spear­head­ed by the late Bas­deo Pan­day, Shouter Bap­tist Lib­er­a­tion Day be­came a pub­lic hol­i­day, al­low­ing for the cel­e­bra­tions that are tak­ing place all across the coun­try to­day.

Giv­en the his­to­ry that makes this day and the na­tion­wide com­mem­o­ra­tions pos­si­ble, it is im­por­tant to main­tain the promi­nence of Lib­er­a­tion Day and en­sure that gen­er­a­tions to come are aware of the strug­gles to gain re­li­gious free­doms.

No­vem­ber 28, 1917, marked the be­gin­ning of dark days of re­pres­sion and pros­e­cu­tion when the Shouters’ Pro­hi­bi­tion Or­di­nance was passed against the faith by the British colo­nial au­thor­i­ty.

For the next 34 years, their dis­tinc­tive style of wor­ship, with bell ring­ing, stamp­ing of feet, shout­ing, danc­ing and singing loud­ly and “catch­ing pow­er”. re­gard­ed as “too noisy” and “too African” by the pow­ers that be, was il­le­gal. Spir­i­tu­al Bap­tists were pro­hib­it­ed from hold­ing meet­ings, bap­tis­ing new mem­bers in the rivers or sea­sides, or par­tic­i­pat­ing in any of the rit­u­als as­so­ci­at­ed with their faith.

Any­one caught in any of these ac­tiv­i­ties was li­able, up­on con­vic­tion, to a hefty fine or im­pris­on­ment with hard labour.

It took per­sis­tent lob­by­ing by some lead­ers of the faith, among them El­ton Grif­fith, Granville Williams, Philip Granger, An­drew Bal­four and oth­ers, to con­vince the au­thor­i­ties to re­peal the or­di­nance.

And so it was, on March 30, 1951, that Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion and So­cial Ser­vices Roy Joseph pi­lot­ed the mo­tion in the Leg­isla­tive Coun­cil to give Spir­i­tu­al Bap­tists their free­dom of wor­ship.

Among those speak­ing in sup­port of the mo­tion was Ash­ford Sinanan, the mem­ber for Na­pari­ma, who said, “It was im­por­tant for every man to be al­lowed to wor­ship God as he pleas­es.”

Al­so con­tribut­ing to the de­bate was labour hero Tubal Uri­ah But­ler, then the mem­ber for St Patrick West, who de­clared, “I will vote heart and soul for the re­peal of the or­di­nance.”

It was fit­ting that on that his­toric day, mem­bers of the West In­di­an Evan­gel­i­cal Spir­i­tu­al Bap­tist Faith cel­e­brat­ed the re­peal of the or­di­nance by hold­ing a wor­ship meet­ing out­side the Leg­isla­tive Coun­cil Cham­ber.

How­ev­er, de­crim­i­nal­i­sa­tion did not mean au­to­mat­ic ac­cep­tance. The re­li­gion has still strug­gled for years with a stig­ma that has not yet been com­plete­ly erased.

The bells be­ing rung in Spir­i­tu­al Bap­tist church­es and pub­lic spaces to­day are sounds of free­dom that should not on­ly be cel­e­brat­ed but pro­tect­ed.

A blessed Lib­er­a­tion Day to the Spir­i­tu­al Bap­tist com­mu­ni­ty.