Archbishop's Easter Sunday appeal: Keep faith in Trinidad and Tobago

Archbishop Jason Gordon said belief in the resurrection of Jesus Christ should enable people to look past hurdles in their lives and have faith that Trinidad and Tobago will get better. He said people who received the risen Christ should not be people who are negative and bitter.

Speaking to a packed congregation at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Independence Square, Port of Spain, on Easter Sunday, Gordon said there was no place for "sour-faced" Christians, as said by Pope Francis, and reminded the congregation whatever they were facing, they know it was not the ending because of the resurrection of Christ.

“We know in the end all things will be well, and if you find all things are not well right now, you know it is not yet the end.

“Keep going forward in the faith that in the end all things will be well because God has raised from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, and if he has raised Christ from the dead, there is nothing in our life that God cannot do, nothing we cannot face with his grace and with the grace of the resurrection mound.

“There is nothing we can’t transform if we understand who he is and what he has done. The resurrection must inform our attitude, it must inform how we speak, it must inform how we treat one another, it must inform how we relate as a family, it must inform how we love."

Gordon said TT was a beautiful country and people would know this if they looked at it through the eyes of the resurrection of Christ.

“We have been looking at our land through the eyes of despair, the eyes of what is wrong, the eyes of blame and shame, the eyes of race and class, the eyes of pain and hurt, the eyes of victimhood, and insofar as we’re looking through those eyes, we are not looking through the eyes of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

“If we look through those eyes, then yes there was pain and the pain was deep and profound, but God has raised us up to be a people who are resilient in the face of difficulty. Many things were terrible about our history but God has been present with us as a people in ways we cannot explain.”

He said often God opened up a way for people but they went back to despair, the emptiness of their lives, blame and shame and other negative things.

“If we believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, then we have no place with negativity, we have no place with speaking badly and ill about people, we have no place in the disrespect we continue to mete out to each other, we have no place for racism, because if we believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, then every creed and race will find an equal place in this beautiful twin-island republic we call TT.”

He said the Gospel of John began the story of the resurrection by echoing the story of Genesis, when light came out of the dark.

“It is still dark in minds of humanity, we have not yet understood what the resurrection means to us and how we live the resurrection in this time. Although the true light had come into the world, many people have shown they have chosen the dark over the light, because he leaves us free will. But when John writes it is the first day of the week, he is saying that the God who said let there be light in the beginning said again let there be light and the dead body of Jesus Christ was raised from the dead.”

Gordon said if people were worried about what was happening worldwide, they did not understand what the resurrection meant and how they should live it.

“How many here are worried about April 28 or 29? How many of you, when you see what is happening in the world, we can no longer go to England without a visa, a pile of tariffs going on everybody, inflation is coming, the price of food, cars, transportation, everything is going to be rising over the next while, how many of you are worried?

“How many of you look at the news every day and feel depressed after you read the news?

“How many of you scroll through social media going reel after reel after reel trying to get dead inside because you just don’t want to feel any more?”

Gordon said the resurrection was not just a matter of history, but one of living faith right now. He said in the same way Jesus walked through walls to meet the disciples, he could come through all the challenges people are facing.

“The resurrection is an event which happened thousands of years ago, but if God raised from the dead Jesus Christ Our Lord, can death, can pain, can hurt, can trials, can tribulations really affect us? If God raised from the dead Jesus Christ Our Lord, then whatever negativity comes our way, we know God triumphs over that, even in the darkest night we know God will come.”