JCC backs pastors filling void

WESTERN BUREAU:

With a shortage of religious education teachers in high schools, the Jamaica Council of Churches (JCC) has said it willing to encourage pastors under its umbrella to step in and fill the breach.

According to Reverend Newton Dixon, the general secretary of the JCC, the matter has come to the attention of the organisation and the council of ministers will be looking at getting more trained pastors to take up the task of teaching religious education in schools.

“I would say getting pastors into the school spaces should be carefully monitored by the denominations that are providing the personnel. Just as in the school system, they would have to vet them through an application process,” said Dixon, who told The Gleaner that the selected persons would have to be fit for purpose.

“I think the denominations may have to play a little part in the supply side in terms of how people are vetted to go forward into the school system. We’re talking particularly about suitability for dealing with children, and we’re talking about the issues relating to the safety of persons around children. So, we have to look at that issue. We must assess whether this person can teach at that level,” said Dixon.

Dixon said religious studies and engagement in faith have a profound impact on not just psychological development and behaviour but personality formation, which will ultimately shape the character of an individual.

Reverend Davewin Thomas, chairman of the St James Minister Fraternal, said the current situation is alarming.

“Unfortunately, we have come to this place in our history where some schools are dropping religious education because they are not able to find teachers,” said Thomas. “It is sad that we have come to this at this moment in our country because, speaking from the point of view of a Christian and a pastor, we know the values of that kind of education on the psyche of the people.”

Thomas, who is also a vice president of the Jamaica Baptist Union, believes there would be less violence in schools if religious education was taught with more frequency.

“Taking, for example, the Ten Commandments and the one that says, ‘Though shall not kill’, had we continued to deposit that in the minds and consciousness of our children, it might have helped them to think twice before taking up a gun,” said Thomas.

‘Colleges should do more’

Linvern Wright, president of the Jamaica Association of Principals of Secondary Schools and principal at William Knibb Memorial High School, is not against recruiting pastors to teach the subject but wants to see the teachers’ colleges leading the way in training educators for the job.

“The Education Code allowed for that. A minister of religion with a degree in theology is quite fine; that works as a pre-trained graduate,” said Wright, who acknowledged that the shortage of religious education teachers has caused some schools to no longer prepare students for the subject in the Caribbean Examinations Council-administered exams.

“Outside the recruiting of religious education teachers from the clergy, I believe the teacher’s colleges should try and do more in getting candidates to enroll in this area of study,” added Wright.

While not rejecting the idea of having pastors teach religious education, Umar Buchanan, a senior liaison officer for the Islamic Council of Jamaica, is concerned about whether Islamic teachings would be delivered without skepticism.

“The problem I would have with that is if these individuals possess the competence to deliver the material relating to other religions,” said Buchanan.

albert.ferguson@gleanerjm.com