Cricket’s almost unique ability to unite the people of the Caribbean has spread to local churches which have decided to put aside their doctrinal differences and unite under the umbrella group HOPE 2007 to clean up Kingston in preparation for what they expect will be a ‘spiritual harvest’ when visitors arrive for the ICC World Cup Cricket starting next month.

The Hope 2007 committee declined to give details, as they said they are currently fine-tuning plans for the month-long event.

According to Errol Rattray of the Errol Rattray Evangelistic Association and chairman of the committee, the details of this effort, which will be conducted in conjunction with the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation, will be disclosed at a press conference scheduled for this Wednesday.

“We are going to mobilise the church and you will see us on the ground in a big way,” was all Rattray would say, adding “it is an evangelical outreach of the church using sports as the medium.”

Rattray explained that HOPE is the acronym for Hospitality, Outreach, Prayer and Empowerment and “is the Christian’s response to World Cup 2007” which, he argued, will present a tremendous opportunity for the church to make a difference and to be a witness of Jesus Christ.

The ICC Cricket World Cup will begin with an opening ceremony on March 11 in Jamaica and is scheduled to end on April 28 with the final game in Barbados.

The organisers expect that more than 100,000 visitors will come into the Caribbean to attend the series of limited-overs games in nine countries – Antigua, Barbados, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, St Kitts, St Lucia, St Vincent, and Trinidad.

“With more than 100,000 people coming here from 16 different cricket playing countries, the entire media world will be here and we feel at this time we need to do something significant, because if there is a murder here the whole world would hear,” said Rattray.

He said the western end of the island will also be involved as a committee has been established there.

The collaborative effort, he added, will involve Youth for Christ, Child Evangelism, Whole Life Ministries and the Bible Society, as well as umbrella groups the Jamaica Council of Churches, Jamaica Association of Evangelicals and the Full Gospel Church.

“Then there are denominations like the Baptist with 330 churches, the New Testament with almost the same, Church of God and the Seventh Day Adventist and a whole lot of other churches are onboard,” he said.

“It is the first time the churches have come together in this kind of response,” he said. “We have come together at different points, but this is a major coming together.”

Rattray said there could be about 40 different entities in terms of major players, but when multiplied will amount to thousands of people.

Percival Palmer from Caribbean Sports Reach and co-chair of the HOPE 2007 committee, told the Sunday Observer that the committee will also extend to the other Caricom territories hosting the tournament.

“We will be focusing on hospitality in terms of encouraging our locals and Christians especially to be hospitable to strangers and also to host the missions teams coming from England and Australia,” said Palmer.

He said that while the availability of the bed and breakfast programme is not a problem in Jamaica, in places like St Kitts they don’t have enough rooms.

“Christians in these places would be invited to be a part of this, to show hospitality to the visitors,” he said.

He said the decision for such a major outreach came out of international experiences where sporting events have presented the opportunity for Christians to evangelise. “Personally, having been to the Olympics in 1996 and 2000 and other events, I have seen how the church has used sports for major outreach,” he told the Sunday Observer.

Palmer said he wanted people to understand that sports can be used to glorify God. “What drives us at Caribbean Sports Reach is Isaiah 42: which states “let them give glory unto the Lord, and declare His praise in the islands”.

Palmer said that during the event a list of activities will be staged, such as a ‘kids game’ session, which will minister to children 6-12, as well as a men’s rally and a boys’ conference.

Within what will be termed ‘The Hope Zone’, there will be prayer, music and counselling as well as the distribution of an interactive pocket guide featuring the testimonies of Christian cricketers.

Palmer said, too, that a prayer committee has been established and its members have already embarked on a 40-day fast, which will continue through to the staging of the event.

“We will be going to the stadiums to pray before the games begin,” he said.

The committee will also be hosting an international sports leadership training conference, which will involve participants from the Cayman Islands, Turks and Caicos, Bahamas, Haiti and Bermuda. “They will come and see what we are doing so they can go back and do stuff like the kids game,” he said.

Palmer was scheduled to leave the island last week for Guyana, Trinidad and St Kitts where an international radiothon was planned to raise funds for some of the ventures associated with Hope 2007.

He said a lot of funding will be needed for ventures like the publishing of The Word for Today, 100,000 copies of which will be given free to persons at the games.

“They have already been featuring cricket testimonies in the last six months and they will be doing a cricket edition in terms of major testimonies of persons during that period,” he said.

Palmer will also be travelling to Barbados and Antigua where he will make contact with persons who will be staging different events under the Hope 2007 banner.

“For St Kitts, I know they have a calendar of events beginning March 1 to the end where they will have a 24-7 village right down in the harbour with a music and ministry clinic going on,” he said.

Palmer said the church was especially expectant as it believes something tremendous will come from the event.

“This year is going to be one of the greatest years and one of the most positive years for the country and the Christian community,” Rattray added in agreement.