St. Joseph, Trinidad by L. Rashford

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 4, 1914

St. Joseph, Trinidad

By L. Rashford

IN February of this year, I was transferred from Grenada to take up work in the island of Trinidad. About ten days after landing I started a tent effort in St. Joseph, the ancient capital, and the most formidable stronghold of Roman Catholicism. Its inhabitants make their boast of being members of the holy Church of Rome. The tent was pitched on the savanna, to the northeast of the town, one of the most pleasant sites in the whole parish. The attendance was fair at the beginning, but after a week the novelty wore off, and the people learned we were Protestant. Some nights the audiences were very small. These people have a decided distaste for anything else than that which they usually term their grandfathers' religion. Five have decided to obey, but the enemy is fighting fiercely for their overthrow.

There is quite an interest in an outlying district, and we have planned for an effort there as soon as the rainy season is past. At this place Protestantism is looked upon with less disfavor. Only

those who have had experience in Catholic fields can appreciate the difficulties and embarrassments which must be encountered in giving the message. The people have been trained for centuries to the sacrifice of the mass, hence they see little or no significance in the sacrifice of Christ. To be denied the Communion by the priest is the surest way of going to purgatory, and by threat of this the people are held in abject fear. Here for the first time I met a full-grown person who could read and yet never had read the Bible.

On a hill two miles from St. Joseph is the shrine of St. Benedict, and people from all parts of the island make that the center of healing, as St. Benedict is a supposed healer. Candles and money must accompany each visitor, and one who visited the place told me that he saw there the greatest quantity of candles he had ever seen at any one time. These candles are sold by the priests for less than the wholesale price.

Ignorance and superstition abound everywhere, and I never appreciated these words of Isaiah any more than I do now: "Darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people." May the Lord help us to be living channels through which the light of his truth can brighten the path of these Rome-enslaved people.

L. RASHFORD.