WESTERN BUREAU – It was, of course, a much different Jamaica that the first Moravians saw when they came to establish the first Protestant church in the island 250 years ago this year, with the slave community being their primary concern.

But as they were in 1754, the Moravians remain a largely rural-based church, as if to remind themselves of their old mandate – to minister to the poor and dispossessed.

As they reflect on this historic milestone, the Moravians of Jamaica celebrate a string of other firsts – one of which is the establishment of primary education in 1823, 61 years before the church was officially incorporated by the Jamaican Parliament.

The reason then was not as lofty as today, but wanting the slaves to read the Bible meant teaching them to read first. That, however, led to primary education which served as a bedrock of elementary education in Jamaica.

But even as it commemorates a glorious tradition of Christian service, the Moravian Church admits that the body has dwindled – from five per cent of the population to one per cent – and must now search deeply within for the answers.

“One thing for sure, we have to refashion the character of our church if we intend to remain a viable option for Christian witness in an increasing religiously plural context,” says Dr Livingstone Thompson, president of the executive board of the Jamaican province.

According to old church records, the Moravian Church was established in Czechoslovakia in 1457. It was the first Christian church to be neither Catholic nor Eastern Orthodox which, in essence, made it the first Protestant church 60 years before the Lutheran Reformation, which gave official birth to Protestantism.

The movement was pioneered by John Hus, who was burnt at the stake in 1415 by Roman Catholic functionaries, after being accused of leading a charge of separation from Roman Catholicism.

The first set of Moravian missionaries arrived in Jamaica from England and included an Irishman, landing off the coast of St Elizabeth. They deliberately shunned the towns, opting to remain mostly in the rural parts to serve the large slave population. Most are to be found today in Westmoreland, St Elizabeth and Manchester.

“The vision of the early missionaries was to the poorer class,” explains Earl Goulbourne, minister in charge of the Bethlehem Moravian Church in St Elizabeth and the Provincial Leaders Conference, with special responsibility to youth work. “And for that reason, most of our congregations are established in rural areas.”

But there was another compelling reason: the health of the missionaries from Europe who often fell victim to the harsh tropical climate and who thrived better in the cool hilly rural areas. “Many died of yellow fever and malaria and when they went to the higher areas, the climate was more in agreement with them,” Goulbourne tells the Sunday Observer.

He refers to documented anecdote in which one Rev E Reinke, a member of the executive board who sought to establish a movement in Kingston in the 1900s, almost lost his place in the ministry.

Though the Moravian Church boasts of its proud record of ministering to the needs of the poor, not unlike other churches at the time, it was not until the end of the 19th Century that native Jamaicans were accepted into leadership positions.

By the middle of the 20th century, full conversion to local leadership commenced. But Thompson acknowledges that the revolution should have begun earlier. “We feel, in a way, that it waited too long, but we can make reference to a number of native Jamaicans who have made significant contributions to the establishment of the Moravian Church,” he asserts.

There are names such as Walter Malton O’Meally, the grandfather of the current post master general Blossom O’Meally Nelson, who was the first native president of the Moravian executive board.

The late S U Hastings was the first native bishop of the church and went on to become the first Jamaican to be elected to head the world Moravian church. He died in the 1990s. Hastings was one of a handful of presidents of the Jamaica Council of Churches (JCC) that served twice.

He was the president of the Council at the time that Jamaica was making its transition from colonialism to independence and also served during what some dubbed “the politically turbulent 1970s”.

The late Dr Robert Cuthbert served for many years as executive director of CADEC, an agency of the Caribbean Conference of Churches which was significant in the 1970s when the churches moved towards regionalism.

“This was part of the same reality of the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME), which Caribbean States are now striving towards. Cuthbert played a leading role in that and he, in a way, symbolises the strength of the Moravian Church as an ecumenical church,” Thompson notes.

Vincent Ignatious Peart played a great role in the formation of the Boys’ Brigade, which is an ecumenical boys’ organisation stressing discipline and service. Justine Peart, who is now retired, made a significant contribution in the development of camps. According to Dr Thompson, all the present leaders of the Moravian Church – himself included and the current Bishop Robert Foster – have come through Peart’s hands.

The Jamaican Provincial Moravian Church is divided into four districts, with each having a minister who is a superintendent. Each superintendent serves on the seven-member executive board, which is completed by two lay persons and Dr Thompson, who is president of the board which oversees the affairs of the province. There are 33 active ordained ministers in Jamaica, two in Cuba and one in the Cayman Islands.

The headquarters of the Moravian Church in Jamaica is located at 3 Hector Street in Kingston. It was bequeathed to the organisation by Mary Morris Knibb, the first elected council woman in Jamaica and a Moravian. She was the founder of the Morris Knibb Preparatory School.

The Lititz All Age School in St Elizabeth is the successor to the first primary school that was established in Jamaica. That school has a current population of about 300 students. It is one of a total of 46 schools established by the Moravian Church in Jamaica, on 68 parcels of lands across the country.

Bethlehem Moravian College in St Elizabeth, formerly Bethlehem Teachers’ College, is one of the signature educational institutions established by the Church. The college was first established in New Port, Manchester. Its first home was the female answer to Mico Teachers’ College, which at the time was an all-male teachers’ college. It initially served for the most part as a vocational trade training centre.

The college was relocated to its present location in Malvern in 1861 where it was the leading female college in Jamaica before its principals decided to begin accepting male students. Lady Ivy Cooke, wife of Governor General Sir Howard Cooke is one of the best known past students of Bethlehem Moravian College.

The Moravian Church is also credited for establishing a training college for men in 1840. But after 50 years of existence it went under, reportedly because of lack of funds. The Moravians are said to be responsible for the introduction of the Irish potato in Jamaica in 1890. This ground provision was introduced by Rev George Lopp at Bethany, North Manchester.

The Jamaica Agricultural Society (JAS), which was established in 1895, benefited significantly in the early years from the involvement of the Moravian Church, especially at Bethany, Mizpah and Nazareth in Manchester and Springfield in St Elizabeth.

They were the first to establish public water supply in St Elizabeth and Manchester by erecting tanks. The establishment of the water tanks was fueled by the need for water in the parishes due to low rainfalls, and what has now become parish tanks established by the government have, as their precursor, tanks that were established by the Moravian Church.

Following the abolishment of slavery, it was the Moravians who established settlements for ex-slaves in Nazareth, Manchester, Beeston Spring and Beaufort near Darliston in Westmoreland.

Attorney-at-law Lowel Morgan, chairman of Bethlehem Moravian College and the man responsible for the development of the land policy of the church, says the Moravian Church has thousands of acres of land in Manchester, St Elizabeth and Westmoreland.

The church is moving towards entering into a joint venture with the National Housing Trust to develop the lands for housing solutions.

“We do not have the resources to develop all of these lands, and so we believe fundamentally in joint ventures.

And so, we are exploring the possibility of entering into a joint venture arrangement with the NHT, for example, or with other developers. Our input into the joint venture would be the land and they would bring other assets such as expertise to it,” Morgan discloses.

A 250th anniversary planning committee has been set up and is feverishly drawing up a calendar of events to commemorate the work and contribution of the Moravians of Jamaica.

email: tysonv@jamaicaobserver.com