FIRST, may I congratulate Philip Hunte for his “true love in Barbados” letter (DAILY NATION, July 16).
The quality of relationships in our society is a subject which demands further scrutiny and considerable sorting and it would be a wonderful antidote to the standard homophobic stuff peddled daily, as it seems, in our newspapers.
Indeed, “true love” was a subject I raised in a lecture with my poverty law pupils some years ago in the University of the West Indies Faculty of Law and for the very reasons Mr Hunte mentions. Sadly, my “centre of excellence” contrived to call the very fact that I raised it sufficient reason to convene an inquisition about my racial prejudices and my tenure was put on the line. I hope Mr Hunte does not suffer a similar fate.
Secondly, I note that in a letter last month I suggested that it would not be long before the assertion of respect for LGBT people would be met with the claim that gayness causes earthquakes. It was therefore impossible to be other than mildly amused to hear that a church leader has suggested that our earth tremors are the finger of God admonishing us about our moral standards. Of course, he is right in one sense.
It is abundantly clear to me that “God’s finger” has been raised because of what He accounts to be our incorrigible inability to be other than homophobic in our perceptions of LGBT people and the spectre of gay marriage. I defy anyone to prove me wrong.
Either way, perhaps it’s time for someone like Mr Hunte to begin another debate which, for now, we might call “superstition in Barbados and its effect on religious belief”. Perhaps we might begin by contemplating St Paul’s question in Romans echoing Isaiah. “Who has known the mind of the Lord?”, Paul asks. Or we might be more direct and from the top take as our text our Lord’s assertion, again echoing Isaiah, “in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men”.
I do hope someone will at least explore further the status and intent of “God’s finger”. If nothing else, it might be fun.
– Fr Clifford Hall