How Times Have Changed

This is the Easter weekend. As a Christian nation, we recognize that the event that we commemorate tomorrow Sunday, is the single most important event in the history of our world, for it is the corner foundation stone on which Christianity’s validity depends.
The resurrection of Jesus Christ remains the indubitable proof that He is, as He proclaimed, the Son of God, the Second Person in the Holy Trinity, the Saviour of all Mankind.
For generations, the period leading up to that one glorious day – a duration of forty days – has been marked by preparation for the event, in the form of fasting, penance, introspection and communion with our Creator.
It has always been regarded as “holy” time, this period of Lent.
There is however, no doubt that the above has changed in recent years, specifically in the island of St. Lucia. The Lenten season has assumed a character whereby it is indistinguishable from the other, normal days of the year.
These past forty days have had probably more entertainment geared to feed the thirst for passionate, wild abandonment than any other similar length at any other time in the past two or three years. Restraint and moderation have been the sacrificial lambs burnt on the altar of desperation in the race to acquire as much of the Almighty dollar as we can.
Weekend after weekend, foreign artistes, mainly from Jamaica – whose music seems to presently be our preferred form of entertainment – have been imported to St. Lucia and succeeded in filling our stadiums and entertainment palaces, to the wild, joyous abandonment and bacchanalian satisfaction of our young people.

We have been preoccupied with everything but the spiritual … sports, politics, business, commission of and the prevention of crime, promiscuous sexual behaviour, physical health issues, all sorts of secular matters have been given priority, while the spiritual has been firmly placed on the back burner … in many cases, it was given so little consideration that one wonders whether it had any place at all on the stove top.
Perhaps the fact that there no longer is a Carnival celebration to point out that Ash Wednesday and the forty days have arrived may be in part responsible for our non-realization that we are actually in the period of Lent.
Perhaps it is the fact that we have evolved into a service-oriented “island paradise”, where we, through necessity, have to constantly cater to the pleasure-seeking side of our many visitors … and to let up, even for four days, much less forty, would result in our being incapable of earning sufficient to support ourselves and the family members who depend upon us?
Be it as it may, our Christian beliefs and practices are under attack by the demands of the changing times … and there are few left who have the means or the moral will to perpetuate them.
What we wish our readers, this weekend, is that whether or not you were able – or remembered – to commune with your God anytime during the past Lenten season, take at least one day off: tomorrow, when the actual resurrection of Jesus Christ is commemorated, to reflect and do so.
Have a holy Easter Sunday.
You can go back to the fetes on Monday.