A policeman stands guard besides the coffin bearing the body of legendary Olympian, Herb McKenley, inside the National Arena on Friday. Mr. McKenley's body was on view for the general public at his alma mater, Calabar High School, and the Arena. He was buried in the National Heroes Park yesterday. - Rudolph Brown/Chief Photographer

THE EDITOR, Sir:

Please allow me space to express my utter disgust and disappointment at the Jamaica Cultural Development Commission (JCDC) for organising a 'wake' or 'set-up' in honour of Herb McKenley. I wonder if this Christian gentleman and the pastor of his church would approve of this event.

In recent years, the JCDC has been taking the lead, under the guise of promoting our culture and reconnecting with our roots, to reintroduce certain pagan practices of our past. It is high time that a voice is raised in protest. Our supposedly Christian country ought to express its strong disapproval of the use of our tax dollars to promote anti-Christian activities in our name.

Because the practices of set-up, or wake, and nine-night are a part of our heritage and culture, does not mean that these practices are necessarily good and to be promoted by a 'Christian nation'. Culture by itself is not always good. There is such a concept of the "supra-cultural": That which is of God and is therefore above culture.

The above-named practices are decidedly a part of our pre-Christian days, and many of our people have fought long and hard to see them put behind us. Wake, nine-night, kumina drumming and dancing, pocomania thumping, etc., are all aspects of demonic spirit-possession practices, and should not be countenanced by people and a country claiming to be Christian.

Last July 31, my wife and I had to walk out in protest from another JCDC-sponsored event at Seville Greathouse in St. Ann's Bay. We did so when someone, claiming to be an "Ashanti princess," proceeded to "pour out a libation" (white rum) to the ancestral spirits from Africa, and requested that the audience also call upon our own ancestors to join us, in celebration of our emancipation.

Certainly, no mention was made of the role of the missionaries and Christian abolitionists who led the fight for abolition and our emancipation from slavery.

Rise of ungodliness

As a country, we have recently been lamenting the rise of ungodliness, lawlessness, and crime, while at the same time giving open approval to activities which fly in the face of a holy God. And then we have the effrontery to lament the unbridled spirit of evil that is abroad, and even call out "Where is the Church? What is it doing to stem the wave of evil?"

We have sown in the wind, we have been acting as if God didn't exist or isn't seeing. Is it any wonder that we are beginning to reap the whirlwind? It is time the nation falls on its collective knees before God and repent.

I am, etc.,

LLOYD A. COKE

Royal Flat,

Mandeville P.O.