Churches as moral compass

Jun 18, 2026 Features / Columnists, The GHK Lall Column

(Kaieteur News) – President Ali got that one right. Institutions such as churches have a duty to function as “society’s moral compass.” I couldn’t agree more with the president. Commend him. More commendations for Excellency Ali: “together let us find the soul of this nation.” Who is so vulgar, so crass, as to take offense at such well-intended words? I don’t. I applaud those words, speaker. For those waiting for the blows on the president’s head, wait on.

Again, I endorse Pres Ali’s call for churches to be “society’s moral compass.” Generally speaking, the moral compass in Guyana’s churches (houses of worship) is in such a state there’s this peculiarity, this reversal of roles. A political leader is calling on churches to set the moral tone, to possess the moral fiber, to manifest the moral courage, to the extent that they become the standard for society at large. Including how it should be for politicians and governments. How is this achieved?

By not pulling punches. By not bowing to curry favour with anyone. The record of Jesus before a king (Herod), a superpower governor (Pilate), and the religious establishment (Caiphas) was of continuous correction and, often, outright confrontation. The latter was unavoidable. Remember his admonition to the Pharisees: stop burdening the ordinary people. Cease and desist with the tiring hypocrisies of holding the commonfolk to one standard, while living at another. One that feathered the nests of religious leaders of his day. Recall: Be done with walking around and making nice speeches intended to impress, but utterly lacking in honesty. Remember his admonition to the chief priests and scribes of his turbulent times about carrying solemn faces everywhere they went, but who were like whitewashed tombs. Clean, perfumed, and presentable externally, but rotting internally from worms having a good time.

I believe that Jesus’ words are relevant in today’s Guyana. To a considerable extent, the local environment glistens with hypocrites, the devious and self-serving, and self-deceivers. Men and women of the cloth-whatever their sacred books, the gods they worship-have equipped themselves with skills that teach how to fall in line, to get their bread buttered. This doesn’t apply to any one spiritual denomination, but to many. It has relevance to not one set of church leaders, but many of them.

It should be an eyeopener to religious leaders and their politically-inclined congregants. They are being seen through. Their games are that transparent. The angles they take are that easily detectable. On this I am immovable, nonnegotiable: spiritual men and women should squirm, appear to have fallen so low, that a politician goes into their midst and sees it fit to lecture them about being “society’s moral compass.” On the face of it, lovely. But does pastor, priest, yogi, or maulana go into the Office of the President, or the Office of the Opposition Leader, and openly teach him or her about clean governance and honest leadership? How should the president or Opposition Leader react? What would those two leaders think? It means not only that this society is upside down. It means that Guyana is in the worst of places.

It has always been my position that the houses of God must represent and insist upon what moral etiquette, moral minimums, and moral excellence are all about. They preach it, they must practice it. The moral high ground, having already been travelled, is removed from the hands of any who make a production out of it. It’s lived. No need for reminders. No thanks.

Pres Ali also spoke of churches helping to “find the soul of this nation.” Resonates. Now try this. Before anyone-president, church leader, believer, citizen-exhort others to help find the soul of this nation, they must first find their own souls. If they do so, they must work tirelessly to save it. Best to the president, his audience, and all Guyana.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper)

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churches, crass, GHK Lall, moral compass, vulgar

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