Fire and Brimstone

Separation of church and state is not practiced in Samoa. School begins each day with worship (a classroom prayer and song), “Have a blessed day in the name of the Lord” is written on all school bulletins, and God is mentioned about 500 times. It works for the Samoan people, though. Almost the entire island is actively Christian (98.3% Christian: 34.8% Congregational Christian,19.6% Roman Catholic, 15% Methodist, 12.7% Mormon (Latter-day Saints), 6.6% Assemblies of God, 3.5 % Seventh-day Adventist),and it’s rare to find someone who doesn’t attend church each Sunday. I’ve come to enjoy the opening prayer, as it mostly a time for thanks giving, and it’s rarely done in a way that would be offensive to non-believers or those of different religions. Wednesday, however, was the exception. At school assemblies, one student is chosen to lead the school wide prayer. They are usually thoughtful and the prayer is presented in a peaceful loving manner, but this time fire and brimstone was the name of the game. It was very uncomfortable, as the student preached for 15 or 20 minutes. Her catch phrase (that she repeated about 200 times) was “Heaven and Hell are real.” She basically lectured/screamed at the students for their actions and claimed that the tsunami hit because Samoa was full of sinners who where moving away from God. She preceded to say that those who were hardest hit probably deserved it, and that this should be a wake up call. One teacher unsuccessfully attempted to stop her, but no one else stepped in. When students are dealing with such tragedy they don’t need to hear about the wrathful God that came down to kill their families and destroy their houses to punish them. She even concluded by speaking in tongues while her body shook. It was definitely an interesting start to the morning....