Get back to the ‘old landmark’ with your children

With the news that young persons, mostly males, are being fingered in some of the most heinous criminal activities in the country, Valrie Campbell James, pastor of Savannah Cross Church of God of Prophecy in Clarendon, is imploring parents to take back control of their children.

The worrying crime statistics were highlighted by Police Commissioner Major General Antony Anderson last Tuesday during his monthly press conference, where he called for help in steering Jamaica’s children away from a life of crime.

Major Anderson made the appeal against the backdrop of a review of the crime statistics which indicated that 875 children have been charged for varying types of crimes since 2019.

Commenting on the figures, Campbell James said the way forward in helping the children, and to turn things around, is to, as a society, decide on an intervention that works.

Citing life’s hardships that some families face which sees mostly single mothers, and sometimes even both parents having to work long and irregular hours, then returning home too tired to conduct a proper update on what their children have been up to in their absence, Campbell James said it is even more important that they allow the church to play a part in the children’s upbringing.

In an interview with Family and Religion, Campbell James said it’s time to get back to “the old landmark” where the church played an integral role in the lives of the children.

“Growing up, it would be the norm for children to attend Sunday or Sabbath school where they would be exposed to good values,” she shared, adding that the verse ‘train up a child in the way he should go’ cements the need for spiritual influence in children and even if they stray, the seed would have already been planted.

With so many things in the world that are distracting children, Campbell James warned that it is dangerous to leave them unmonitored. She mentioned the many violent video games, demonic games, sexual content and all the other kinds of immorality on social media that are only a click away which can lead young minds astray.

“Church is a good place to build self-esteem, to point the way to staying out of trouble, and to provide a support system that will have more than one pair of eyes on your children,” Campbell James stated.

Another positive she highlighted is that children can feel comfortable to approach any of the adults in church on any issues they have, or anything that they need to discuss.

Citing the many fights now taking place in schools, with one student being stabbed to death recently, James said the church also builds children in their social relationships.

“There are so many ills that are affecting society right now, that being active in church can fix,” she noted.

Campbell James said she hopes parents will once again see the merit of having their children being active in church and take the corrective step by sending them, or better yet, taking them to church regularly. That, she said, is the beginning of correcting some of what’s going wrong in today’s society.