Evangelist wants church leaders to help fight crime

Seventh-day Adventist evangelist John FK Martin says he is imploring the church community to get involved in crime fighting in Jamaica.

The clergyman said that he is outraged by the increase in murders, especially the vicious killing of the nation's women and children. He said that in addition to praying, he is urging the religious leaders to become more active in the troubled areas.

"I am not afraid to talk. Too much of us pastors are hugging up and covering up crime like is holiness. The church needs to get more involved in fighting crime. Some of these ministers are too coward. The Bible tells us to go to the uttermost part of the Earth and preach the gospel, but some of us don't want to go there. Instead, we want to stay at the pulpit in A/C and don't want to go out in the heat, and it doesn't work like that," he said.

BAFFLED

Pointing to some of the most recent articles about murders that were published in THE STAR, Martin said that he is baffled by how cruel the perpetrators are.

"When they kill off all the women, we are going to be left with only men. We need to get our country in order. I am calling on the shottas and the thugs to let them know that enough is enough. I am grieving for our nation. Too much of our women and children are being killed," he said.

Martin said that one of the deaths that rocked him was the slaying of 16-year-old Jodi-Ann Deer, who was killed along with two others during a home invasion on Waltham Park Road, St Andrew.

The 54-year-old evangelist, who worships at a church in Portmore, St Catherine, re-emphasised that he wholeheartedly supports the 'eye for an eye' scripture.

"I believe in an eye for an eye. If a man used the gun to take a life, then he should lose his life also. We need to take them back to the gallows to let them know how serious we are. I don't believe in jungle justice because sometimes it is the innocent that is attacked. But I believe if those killers don't get a taste of their own medicine, we won't see a decline in the crime rate," he said.