Raphael John-Lall

raphael.lall@guardian.co.tt

Chair­man of the In­ter-Re­ligous Or­gan­i­sa­tion (IRO) Rev­erend Dr Knol­ly Clarke yes­ter­day urged cit­i­zens to sup­port to­day’s Na­tion­al Day of Prayeras he says the coun­try is fac­ing dark times.

“It is im­por­tant to ask God to show us the way and to guide us through this very chal­leng­ing time. I am very pos­i­tive about this,” he taid

Church­es across the coun­try have been asked to sup­port the event which be­gins with ec­u­meni­cal prayer ser­vice broad­cast live from the Diplo­mat­ic Cen­tre, St Anns, on CNC3, TTT, TV6, Ra­dio 99.1, Ra­dio 100.1, i95.5 Ra­dio Heart­beat 104.1 and Ra­dio Talk City 91.1 from 10 am.

Var­i­ous re­li­gious groups are sup­port­ing the ini­tia­tive which was an­nounced by Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley fol­low­ing an up­surge in COVID-19 cas­es.

The Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sa­ba (SDMS) said the Dhar­ma­charya Pun­dit Dr Ram­per­sad Paras­ram will join the Prime Min­is­ter and rep­re­sen­ta­tives of oth­er faiths at the ser­vice. In ad­di­tion, from 5 pm to 7 pm the Pan­dit Parishad will re­cite a por­tion of the Suk­la Ya­jur Ve­da known as the Sri Rudram. This will be broad­cast live on Ra­dio and TV Jaagri­ti and streamed live on the Face­book pages of the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha and Ra­dio and TV Jaagri­ti.

An­gli­can Bish­op Claude Berkley said he will of­fer prayers and bells will be rung across the dio­cese at 10 am, 11 am and 12 noon in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Na­tion­al Day of Prayer.

Mod­er­a­tor of Pres­by­ter­ian Church Rev­erend Joy Ab­dul-Mo­han said a ser­vice had been planned long be­fore the Prime Min­is­ter’s an­nounce­ment but they even­tu­al­ly ad­just­ed the time to fit in with the na­tion­al ser­vice. She said it is a time for “uni­ty in di­ver­si­ty” and “break­ing down walls.”

“Fol­low­ing health pro­to­cols and sav­ing lives are more fun­da­men­tal and nec­es­sary than the almighty dol­lar as busi­ness per­sons re­mind­ed us re­cent­ly. We may not see the re­sults of unit­ed prayer im­me­di­ate­ly but it is a re­flec­tion of our uni­ty and putting aside our po­lit­i­cal and re­li­gious dif­fer­ences,” she said.

PRO of the An­ju­man Sun­nat-ul-Ja­maat As­so­ci­a­tion (AS­JA) Imam Raf­fa­ic Mo­hamed said the Mus­lim or­gan­i­sa­tion ful­ly sup­ports the Na­tion­al Day of Faith and will be fol­low­ing the live broad­cast.