There is an accompanying view that the church’s identity has always been a mish-mash of influences from traditional Hindu practices to orthodox Protestantism to modern-day evangelistic fervour and the T&T church’s unique brand of ecumenism.
In some instances, Presbyterians continue to reflect selected religious practices of their progenitors alongside the Biblical theology that guided the process of conversion.
For example, former Presbyterian moderator, Rev Elvis Elahie, believes traditional puja protocols are mirrored in the current practices of congregants when, for example, they assemble for private and public services.
This, in his view, “suggests an over-emphasis on ritual. With this emphasis the church fails at making practical and necessary interventions in response to our social decay,” he said.
In some churches, longstanding “Christian bhajans” in Hindi/Bhojpuri are still sung at special events and a Hindi hymnal was published just 15 years ago. The popular Karo Maree Sahai, for instance, is a tribute to Mary, mother of Jesus and can be found in church song books.
These features of worship have contributed to the view that Indians of the Presbyterian Church, originally under the banner of the Presbyterian Church of the Maritime Provinces of Canada, have carved out for themselves a distinctive social and cultural mystique.
But the story is bigger than that.
When questioned about the cultural cross-currents leading to contemporary religious practices among the predominantly Indian Presbyterian population, theologian Rev Harold Sitahal directed T&T Guardian to his 1968 McGill University thesis. The paper argues that “the role of the Presbyterian Church in Trinidad was and is an involvement in the process of westernisation of this racial group.”
There is an ensuing view that the “creolising” effect of what Sitahal continues to view as “westernisation” is what separates Presbyterians from other Indians.
The late public intellectual, Lloyd Best, even found cause to identify a high level of political cohesion among Presbyterian Indians in suggesting that this group was one of “The Nine Political Tribes of T&T”—not by default aligned to the political cleavages of their Hindu or Muslim counterparts.
Best also spoke often of the “San Fernando Presbyterians” who supported the Afro-Trinidadian dominated People’s National Movement of the early years of independence.
But Elahie believes there is a basis for suggesting that Presbyterians maintain a strong sense of Indian identity, even in the way some occasions are observed.
“If you listen to people talk about May 1845 in terms of Indian Arrival, it is similar to how we in the Presbyterian Church now celebrate anniversary,” he told T&T Guardian.
“It seems to be a celebration of time,” he explained.
“There is hardly anything…to say, after so many years, this is what we have realised.”
“Anniversary seems to be a celebration of time and a reference to history and not necessarily an acknowledgement of what we have now,” Elahie said. He also does not appear to be entirely inspired by the current state of affairs.
Sitahal, however, holds a more positive view. “We are going through growing pains,” he said. “The leaders are making an effort to be relevant and meaningful in our social environment.”
However, the figures are hardly encouraging. In Sitahal’s 1968 study, he noted the 1960 national census report which put the Presbyterian population at marginally over ten per cent of the colony’s 301,946 East Indians–16,415 male and 15,994 female worshipers equaling 32,409.
On the church’s official website, 57 years later, a membership of 40,000 is cited, including 105 congregations and 100 “house fellowships.”
The Demographic Report of the 2011 Census however puts the figure at 32,972, a drop of ten per cent from the 2000 estimate of 36,710.
The precise figure becomes even more confusing when considering that in 2007 during an incorporation exercise, “we did not exceed 20,000,” according to Elahie, who was engaged in the exercise.
Sitahal, however, focuses on the church’s activist role over the years, and his belief that next year’s 150 year celebrations will “bring more life” to what appears to be a dismal situation.
Sitahal was in the 1970s, together with noted Presbyterian leader, theologian Rev Idris Hamid, a part of the movement that advocated for “liberation theology”, then popular among Latin American Catholic leaders and which saw closer involvement by the church in often contentious social movements.
Presbyterian leaders such as Hamid and Sitahal were close collaborators with leaders of the Black Power Movement of the 1970s, in the process facing a measure of ostracism from some sections of the church.
This also helped define a more distinct identity for Presbyterians and opened the door for deeper embrace of the notion of ecumenism which brings different Christian faiths in closer communion.
Evidence of the church’s leading role in this regard came through expanded interest in the work of the St Andrew’s Theological College as a source of religious instruction for people from a cross-section of Christian denominations.
There is no single explanation for the decline of such engagement in recent years, but there are claims linked to broader national developments and the role of ethnicity in politics.
Though the early Presbyterian movement in Tobago, championed by the Church of Scotland, pre-dated the Canadian Mission of Trinidad by almost a century, its core membership on the island came mainly from the community of freed African slaves.
However, in recent years, the growing number of Indo-Trinidadians involved in commercial and other projects in Tobago has witnessed the emergence of a fledgling Presbyterian Church—Tobago arm whose congregation regularly worships at the St Francis Anglican Church in Bon Accord.
The other arm of the Presbyterian movement emerged in 1937 courtesy a missionary from the Greyfriars Church in Glasgow, Scotland.
Early Presbyterianism was also recognisable through the work of Portuguese immigrants in the 19th Century who eventually became housed at what became known as the St Ann’s Church of Scotland in Port-of-Spain.
Sitahal, a strong advocate of ecumenical collaboration, believes the church he has spent a lifetime supporting is seeing “a lot of energy in various directions” in preparation for the 150th anniversary and he sees a likely resurgence in interest.
There are many among the ranks of the church’s dwindling membership who would be praying he is right.