WILD COOT: How you know? Baffling

AN OLD LADY, she must be about 96, she told me that she was still perking. Well, she called me in disgust. She said she was an avid reader of the Holy Book. However, she was saddened when reading the WEEKEND NATION of Friday, July 3. “I like to read what Lowdown writes, but last time he was too depressing.”

“I also like what the goodly Reverend said on Page 14, but I ask myself, ‘How he know what sin God will condone?’ He got to be a magician or something because as far as I am concerned, there is no telephone link, not even a cellphone with Digicel. I believe that every single one of us is entitled to what people call blind faith. That is a personal issue. It is, however a different thing to pontificate and try to ram it down people’s throat, especially when the threat of fire and brimstone is thrown into the mix.

“Look,” she was getting passionate, “it is true that the preachers are little by little gravitating away from what is in the Holy Book. Take for instance most professors of Christianity eat pork, shellfish, gamble, ‘adulterate’, fornicate (legally accepted), engage in polygamy, etc, and still donate religiously to the church and drink the holy wine. Nobody vex with them. Those who commit murder are now spared the gallows contrary to Exodus 21:12-14. Obeah men and women should be put to death, Exodus 22:18. Animal sexing – death, Exodus 22:19.

Society is evolving

Adultery, death (half the population), Leviticus 20:10. Homosexual, death, Leviticus 20:13. False claims of a woman’s virginity at time of marriage, death, Deuteronomy 22:13-21 and yes, read Deuteronomy 22:23-24. So how does the goodly Reverend know which sin God condones or not condones? Foolishness! Society is evolving even if some people are left in the antediluvian age, so those who call themselves Christians are evolving. Who knows if and where same-sex marriages will take us. I only hope I do not live to see it.

“And look at that fellow Joey Harper – never a truer word. We are a something for something society. You better believe it. Opponents of the idea only kicking down the ladder having reached the top rung.

“The paper left me with a lump in my throat as Gal Friday’s experiment was a microcosm of the bribery and corruption that now stalks our land. She would have had to pull out a Grantley for a vote. Her revelation perhaps may be a societal trait left over from survival instincts cultivated in our African links or the tribulations of slavery.

“Young Lowdown took the cake. He made two critical points that you Wild Coot have been stressing. One, Trinidadian entities have been deliberately destroying the fabric of our ability to produce for ourselves, making us dependent on their exports as their country develops an exporting (mainly food) sector. They seem to have our ministerial blessing. Two, our banks that are mainly Trinidadian are securing more and more of the senior jobs for Trinidadians while Bajans are confined to be support staff. This can be seen, as you pointed out already, in the cheaper cost of employing Trinidadian senior persons rather than Barbadian persons. The cost savings is in the difference in currency value. This is unfair in as much as the working capital of the bank is Barbados savings dollars, the profits are in Barbados dollars and the corporate investment is small in comparison.”

I was admiring the perspicacity of this almost centenarian. She was relentless.

“Another thing Wild Coot. Just let the bishop refuse to marry a same-sex couple if ever, God forbids, we like fools follow the United States and Canada. He would feel what life is like at St Philip. He would have a captive audience. Do you not realise that the legal blessing of such a ‘sintin’ has freedom of speech implications, even freedom of preaching or transaction dealings. It curtails the use of certain words and arguments.

“That over-60 business by the Government is a thin edge of the wedge. It will spread like a cancer when money becomes more scarce among the civil people.

“Wild Coot, keep up the good works and hope that you live to my age. Play Island In The Sun on the pan.”

* Harry Russell is a banker. Email quijote70@gmail.com