The True Meaning of Christmas

Jesus, Christ, God, Holy, Spirit, Bible

As Christians get ready to commemorate the birth of Jesus Christ on December 25 (millions of Orthodox Christians commemorate Christmas on January 6 or 7), many people have little or no interest in the birth of the Christ child.

Christmas for many people, is simply a time to go shopping, giving and receiving gifts, partying and over-indulgence in meat and drink.

In the hustle and bustle leading up to December 25, many shoppers could not care less about the religious significance of the holiday, but Christmas means more to Christians than shopping, giving and receiving gifts, partying and over-indulgence in meat and drink.

According to Christian theology, the birth of the Christ child is a most important step in the fulfillment of God’s plan to reconcile humans to Himself after the catastrophic fall into sin in the Garden of Eden. 

The birth of Jesus Christ is of extreme importance to Christians.

 Christianity teaches that Adam and Eve’s disobedience in the Garden of Eden, led to the separation of man from God and all subsequent human beings inheriting Adam’s sin nature.

The penalty for man’s disobedience is death (Roman 6:23) and God being righteous and just, could not allow man’s transgressions to go unpunished.

Additionally, to make atonement for man’s sin required the death of someone who had never sinned, that is, a ‘spotless lamb’.

The birth of the Christ child, begins a series of events in which God demonstrated His love for mankind (John 3:16), by taking unto Himself human form to live a life free of sin so that He could satisfy His righteous justice by dying  in man’s place.

To Christians, the commemoration of Jesus’ birth is more than just another holiday.

It is more than a time to exchange gifts, for family gatherings and a time for feasting and merriment.

Christmas is more than a time for demonstrating temporary goodwill and charity to the homeless and less fortunate members of society.

To Christians, Christmas is about the greatest gift given to mankind.

Christmas is about God giving Himself as a gift to mankind as part of His Redemption plan.

As you commemorate or celebrate the Christmas holidays, spare a thought for the reason Immanuel (God with us) came into the world.

2nd Teacher Video Gone Viral!

A second video featuring a Jamaican high school teacher has gone viral on Twitter!

This video is in sharp contrast to last week’s viral video.

 The teacher in this video is, thankfully, not promising to “kill” a student or questioning students’ intelligence.   This teacher has her students’ undivided attention in her integrated science class, as teacher and students sing and dance to a pulsating drum rhythm.

Yes sing and dance!

Image result for open source images of singing and dancing black classroom

 The teacher converted her lesson to a song and has her students spellbound as they sing and dance while learning about solids, gases and liquids.

Teacher and students are smiling, singing and dancing. No student is misbehaving!

Her students adore and respect her and declare “she knows how to teach students”.

 This teacher, who also teaches human and social biology, is an outstanding ambassador for the teaching profession.

Her dedication to her students and the creativity she employs to grab and hold their attention, are qualities all teachers should endeavour to emulate.

 This video demonstrates it is not all gloom and doom in today’s classrooms.  For sure there are too many disruptive and disrespectful students. There are also teachers who occasionally “lose it” when faced with rude, disruptive and disrespectful students.

I, however, wish to believe teachers who “lose it” are in the minority and the majority of teachers are similar to the singing and dancing teacher.

They may not utilize singing and dancing to impart their lessons, but they are no less dedicated to the cause of educating students.

This video is a good counterpoint to the irate teacher’s video and shows what is possible when a dedicated teacher and a class of cooperative students decide to work together in the interest of education.

What is this teacher’s motivation?

 In her own words “I love children and I think that is key. Whatever you do to a child, they will remember. So I intentionally, I purposefully give these children life, so if they’re not getting this positivity elsewhere, when they come to school Monday to Friday, they’re gonna get it from me.”

The teaching profession is not for everyone.  If you are contemplating entering the profession, you would do well to consider the singing teacher’s motivation.

Irate Teacher Threatens to Kill Student

There is never a dull moment in Jamaica!

The latest viral video making the rounds on social media is that of a high school teacher threatening (later in the video she clarified it was not a threat but a promise) to kill a student!

“Mi wi kill you in yah bwoy” (Translation: I will kill you in here boy), the teacher is heard telling the student in the video.

From what I gather through the print and electronic media, the teacher’s rage was occasioned by the student’s repeated defiance of her instructions to remain quiet, as a fellow student made a complaint of theft against him.

The offending student is alleged to have raised his voice in response to the teacher’s instructions and this prompted her to declare “Weh yah shout after mi fah? Mi look like you mumma?” (Translation: Why are you shouting at me? Do I look like your mother?).

When the student protested the reference to his mother, the teacher questioned his intelligence, declared “Mi wi murder you inna diss” (Translation: I will murder you in this), before unceremoniously chasing the student from the classroom!

The minister with responsibility for education condemns the teacher’s behaviour, the school’s board of management is to conduct an investigation and the teachers’ union is describing the incident as “unfortunate”.

I don’t know what to make of the teacher’s behaviour! My initial reaction is to think her mental state needs to be evaluated as her reaction appears to be disproportionate to the student’s behaviour.

The job of a teacher is not an easy one in today’s classrooms. Many of today’s students do not approach teachers with the same adoration and respect of students of yesteryear.

The fact the student felt empowered to engage the teacher as he would his peers, suggests a total disregard for authority.

The teacher’s response is frightening, as one would think she would have been trained, not only to impart knowledge, but to effectively deal with recalcitrant students.

Most high schools have deans of discipline and guidance counselors to assist with undisciplined students, so I would think there is no need for a teacher to act in the manner recorded.

The teaching profession is one only people with the right aptitude should enter. To be a teacher, requires you to be an even-tempered, people person with a gift for nurturing young minds.

Students will be coming from different backgrounds with different levels of socialization and teachers should be trained to professionally cope with a variety of possible scenarios.

No matter how badly a student is behaving, a teacher is expected to remain in control. It is never acceptable to threaten or promise to kill a student.

My sympathy goes out to the teacher, as she strikes me as a stressed out individual who buckled under the cumulatively weight of constantly dealing with disruptive and disrespectful students.

I hope the investigation not only looks at the teacher’s behaviour but what could possibly have triggered it.

In the meantime I hope “Mi wi kill you in yah bwoy” is a threat and not a promise.

The Cursing Valedictorian-Speech Rated X

Image result for image of a graduation cap and diploma
Graduation Cap and Diploma

One of the most talked about news stories this week, was the valedictorian’s use of a Jamaican expletive in closing his valedictory address to the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts graduating class of 2019.

The young man’s use of the expletive generated mixed reactions, with comments ranging from it was “inappropriate and indecent!” to “nothing is wrong with it as it is part of our culture!” and “he was exercising his freedom of speech!”

I am coming down on the side of those who consider use of the expletive “inappropriate”.

Some members of the intelligentsia, are promoting the view that Jamaican expletives are a part of our African ancestry and should be embraced and used without concern they are generally considered offensive.

They further contend, that laws making the use of expletives in public an offence, are vestiges of our colonial masters’ disdain for our African heritage and should be expunged.

There is some truth in the above, as those in the know, claim most of our expletives can be traced to the language our ancestors spoke on the sugar plantations and the colonial authorities banning of the use may indeed, be indicative of more than a little racial prejudice!

Having said that, however, one cannot escape the fact that modern societies are constructed on the basis of a shared set of values and morals agreed by the majority.

Additionally, every culture has words, phrases and expressions that are considered generally offensive and inappropriate for use in public or specifically offensive to segments of society.

The fact these words, phrases and expressions are part of the culture does not give one licence to use them without regards for shared values.

For example, it is considered racist, offensive and inappropriate for a ‘white’ American to refer to a ‘black’ American as a ‘nigger’!

Saying Jamaican expletives are a part of our culture, does not make use of them in a formal setting of adults, parents, children, faculty and other well-wishers any less inappropriate.

Saying it is part of our culture does not disinfect its use! It must be viewed through the lens of society’s norms and values.

To hear some tell it, the mere fact something is “part of our culture” makes it exempt from criticism and suitable for any occasion. However, with a minimum of effort, I can think of a number of cultural practices from our African ancestry that we do not embrace.

As for freedom of speech, it is instructive to note that freedom of speech does not give one the right to say anything one wishes.

Freedom of speech is not only circumscribed by laws of slander and libel but by societal norms and values.

I fully appreciate that some laws carried forward from our colonial past, had their origins in the desire to suppress African cultural expressions and reinforce European norms. I do not, however, subscribe to the view all laws from that era must be abandoned.

As one person said “even a broken clock is right twice a day”.

This trend towards individualism without regards for the sensibilities of others is a recipe for chaos and conflict.

An agreed set of shared values and norms is essential for the harmonious and effective functioning of every society and nation.

The valedictorian’s use of the expletive in his speech was, by Jamaican norms and values, inappropriate!

Doctor Held Hostage By Politician

If you live in Jamaica, one of the things you learn at an early age is, if you believe you are being ignored, one sure way to get attention is to ‘gwaan bad’ (translation: behave badly).

To ‘gwaan bad’ means to behave in a loud, boisterous, unruly manner, complete with generous sprinklings of expletives.

Every Jamaican knows that behaving badly is a sure way to get instant service at most places of business, government offices and hospitals. 

When all else fails, behaving badly is guaranteed to get you the attention of your member of parliament, local government representative and utility companies.

This tactic is especially effective, if you block a heavily trafficked road and prevent law-abiding citizens from going about their regular daily activities.

Surprisingly, the most recent example of someone behaving badly didn’t produce the desired result.

The main actor in the drama is a local government representative who took her 8-month-old son to the accident and emergency department of the island’s children’s hospital.

Information in the public domain is the local politician’s son had a high fever.  The infant was assessed by hospital personnel and his condition was deemed not to be an emergency.

The politician was apparently not satisfied with the diagnosis, so she barged into the doctor’s office, while consultation was ongoing with another patient, demanding to know what was wrong with her child.

Depending on who is recounting the event, the politician went into the office, closed the door behind her and stood by the door or she barricaded the door with a stool.

This action led to some pushing and shoving and presented the politician an opportunity to demonstrate her impressive command of Jamaican expletives.

After escaping from her ‘prison’, the doctor recounted her ordeal to her colleagues and the A & E department was shut down for two hours as staff protested abuse meted out on a daily basis.

While I can understand a mother’s anxiety, even desperation, when faced with a sick baby, the politician’s action cannot be defended.

Her behavior is inexcusable.

This takes me to my main point.

Every Jamaican who has to access public health services knows that the wait to see a doctor is agonisingly long, facilities are understaffed, lacking in resources and staff is overworked and stressed.

However, instead of insisting the government and their elected representatives put more resources into hospitals and clinics, they choose instead to verbally, and sometimes, physically assault the doctors and nurses who are providing outstanding service in less than ideal conditions.

The dissatisfaction with poor public health facilities and services should be directed towards the elected government who collect taxes to provide health and other services and provide only the bare minimum.

Do you ever notice that when ministers of government fall ill they do not go to public hospitals?

Hell no! Public hospitals are not good enough for them!  Public health facilities are for the masses! Government ministers access healthcare overseas or at privately operated facilities.

It is high time voters insist public health facilities be raised to a standard suitable for access by members of the government.

Voters need to stop casting their ballots blindfolded and start using their votes to demand and hold governments accountable for better public services.

If public services are not good enough for the prime minister and his ministers than it is not good enough for voters!

Schoolboy Crushed By Garbage Truck

Last week Monday, October 28, a seven-year-old primary school student was crushed by an ‘unmanned’ garbage truck! 

Reports in the media are the truck was on the school compound to collect the school’s waste, when it suddenly started moving before crashing into a car and overturning on the child.

As a parent, I try to imagine the anguish and despair of the child’s parents on receiving news of their son’s death and the manner of his death.

If it were my child, chances are I would have died upon receiving the news.

 The possibility of your child getting seriously injured at home, at school, on the road or any location, must be parents’ worse nightmare.   One can therefore imagine the devastating effects of receiving news of a child’s death

There is nothing anyone can say to reduce the grief the child’s parents must be experiencing. We can only pray they receive the psychological and spiritual counselling they will surely require to accept and manage this most traumatic of experience.

Psychological and spiritual counselling shall also be required for students, teachers and parents who witnessed the tragic event.

The child’s death, reminded me of one of my pet peeves with local government authorities. It is the failure to provide some basic services.

I sometimes wonder where our tax dollars go, as municipal authorities cannot even arrange for our garbage to be collected on a regular schedule.

In my community, no one knows when household waste will be collected. Collection can vary from twice each week, to every two weeks, to whenever the truck turns up!

In the worse case scenario, the explanation for non-appearance of the truck is, invariably, the truck was in the garage for repairs.

For the life of me, I can’t understand why each municipal authority does not have a fleet of well-maintained trucks for garbage collection, instead of relying on independent contractors with one or two pieces of junk loosely described as trucks.

A common feature of these ‘garbage trucks’ is they have seen better days and should not be on the road!

Now we are faced with a situation where one of those pieces of junk drove itself before crashing into a car and overturning on a child.

As far as I am concerned, there can be only two possible explanations for the self-driving garbage truck. Either the truck was not properly parked, that is, transmission in park and handbrake applied or the old truck was defective and not roadworthy.

Personally, I suspect it is the second of the two options but I await the finding of the investigations.

Hopefully, this little boy’s death will not be in vain and before long, we shall see school and household waste collected on a schedule by fleets of trucks, owned and maintained by local government authorities.

That is the least we deserve and expect for our tax dollars.

Same-sex Relationship and The Church

Last week I wrote about the court case between the mayor of Montego Bay, Montego Bay Municipal Corporation (MBMC) and LGBT group, Montego Bay Pride (Mobay Pride).

This week, I have some thoughts on a reader’s comment on the case in one of the daily newspapers.

The reader took issue with a group of Christians demonstrating in support of the mayor’s decision to deny Mobay Pride use of a cultural centre to discuss the readiness of Jamaica for same-sex marriage.

The reader commented Christians were up in arms over a group of consenting adults wanting to discuss same-sex marriage, but there is no demonstration when ministers of religion and Christians in general commit rape, adultery, fornication and other immoral and criminal acts.

There can be no gainsaying that the practice of a homosexual lifestyle is not more sinful than other acts listed as sins in the Holy Bible.

However, the promoters of same-sex relationships are unique when compared to other sinners, in that no other group of sinners have formed themselves into powerful lobby groups to promote acceptance and normalization of their lifestyle.

For example, there is no organization of thieves, fornicators, adulterers or drunkards, demanding their activities be tolerated, even legalized and laws put in place to punish those refusing to accept their lifestyle as normal.

I am not aware of any group representing thieves, demanding to be accepted as thieves as they did not choose to be thieves but were born as thieves.

Furthermore, I am unaware of thieves, for example, asserting they are followers of Christ, while insisting on continuing to steal as they are now Christian thieves.

LGBT groups and their supporters, are less than honest when attempting to portray the Church as having a fascination with their lifestyle while ignoring perpetrators of other sins.

Truth is, the Church highlights all sinful acts and beseech sinners to turn away from sin before it is too late.

Promoters and practitioners of same-sex relationships attract greater attention, simply because of their insistence their behaviour is not sinful, is normal and must be accepted by all.

They attract greater attention as a consequence of their quest to silence and persecute all who dare to criticize their lifestyle.

Mobay Pride Caught With Pants Down

“Court of Appeal Overturns Interim Injunction Granted To Montego Bay Pride” read the breaking news headline.

It was the latest twist in an unfolding drama starring the mayor of Montego Bay, the St.  James Municipal Corporation and gay-rights group Montego Bay Pride, better known as Mobay Pride.

The opening scene of the drama saw Mobay Pride asserting that Montego Bay Arts Council, granted them permission to rent the Montego Bay Cultural Centre for a series of activities, including a forum on same -sex marriage.

During a meeting of the St. James Municipal Corporation, the mayor is reported to have expressed his intention to revoke permission for Mobay Pride to use the facility in order “to preserve the sacredness” of the space!

Scene Two

Armed with knowledge the law as sometimes called an ass, Mobay Pride rushed to the Supreme Court, where they sought and were granted an interim injunction, compelling the corporation to afforded them use of the ‘sacred’ facility, pending judicial review of the corporation’s decision.

Scene Three

Unperturbed, the municipal corporation appealed the Supreme Court’s decision in the Court of Appeal culminating in the breaking news headline!

Mobay Pride was confident they would have prevailed in the Court of Appeal, as they contended the corporation’s action was in breach of their constitutional right to freedom of speech and protection from discrimination based on sexual orientation.

They never saw the corporation’s carefully laid ambush!  

The corporation’s attorney skillfully argued Mobay Pride had no case as they failed to apply for permits required to host the event, therefore the corporation could not revoke permission that was never sought and received!

Mobay Pride was caught with their pants down and had no rebuttal to the body blow.

Their normally swaggering spokesman was reduced to muttering he did not know they required permits for the events!

I too was blindsided by the no permit argument.

I am shocked Mobay Pride failed to apply for the relevant permits.

Luckily, I am not a betting man, as I was willing to wager, that, relying on the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms, the case was a slam-dunk for Mobay Pride.

I hate being proved wrong, but I must admit Mobay Pride got their collective butt kicked by the corporation’s attorney.

I suppose they are now questioning if the law is really an ass!

Mobay Pride says the fight is not over as the forum must be held at a place where everybody can be accommodated.

Scene four

Your guess is as good as mine!

In the interim I shall be keeping my pants securely buckled to my waist.

The Senator and The Breast

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

It is a time when the scourge of breast cancer is highlighted, information is shared on detection and treatment, and survivors get the chance to inspire with their stories of bravery and determination.

Like most countries, Breast Cancer Awareness Month is recognized in Jamaica.

But unlike other countries, we found a way to introduce a little controversy into our 2019 recognition!

It all started when an Opposition member of the Senate, in his contribution to the chamber’s recognition of the month, thought it necessary to advise that he is a ‘breast man’.

To further burnish his breast-loving credentials, he proceeded to explain that his mother certified him a ‘breast man’ as he was still drinking breast milk at close to one and a half years old.

He apparently made some useful comments about cannabis providing a potential cure for breast cancer, but the media didn’t think it newsworthy, so they ran with the ‘breast man’ angle.

As soon as the story broke, social-media erupted in a firestorm of outrage, with female supremacists and gender activists condemning the breast-loving senator for sexualizing the matter and seeing women as only objects of sexual desire.

There was nothing the breast-loving senator could say or do, to placate his distractors. Not even the revelation he lost an aunt to breast cancer.

It did not help that he initially sought to justify his breast man comment, before issuing something resembling a distant relative of an apology!

Poor senator!

If only he had spoken to me before his now infamous utterance.

I would have counselled him that, in the eyes of female supremacists, any reference to a woman, apart from her brain, education, intelligence and strength is taboo!

Make no mention of her physical beauty. Make no mention of face, breasts, legs, buttocks or other body parts.

Making mention of any feature below a woman’s neck is ‘objectifying’ and ‘sexualizing’ her!

The senator is totally at fault.

He should have restricted his comments to the seriousness and prevalence of breast cancer.

He should have sympathized and expressed empathy for both survivors and those battling breast cancer.

He should have encouraged healthy lifestyles and regular mammograms for early detection.

Finally, since he is a disciple of the school of thought that cannabis is the cure for everything, he could have expressed his hope for an early cannabis cure.   

Leave the ‘breast man’ comment for your next visit to KFC!!

Additionally, nobody cares how long you drank breast milk!

Get with it senator!