Jamaican born actress turned Fitness and Life Coach Denise Hunt will be among the featured presenters at the WELS (Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod) South Central District GROW Conference, to be held at the Abiding Word Church in Houston, Texas from Thursday February 3 to Friday February 4.

The two day event brings together WELS pastors, teachers and lay leaders from across the South Central US regions of the synod – including Texas- with the aim of  fostering growth and greater understanding  of  the various roles within the church through a variety of presentations, workshops and fellowship opportunities.

Hunt, a born again Christian, media practitioner and former thespian is best known for her small but memorable role in the box office hit How Stella Got Her Groove Back, opposite Academy Award nominee Angela Bassett and Taye Diggs. She will deliver her presentation – Culture in Christianity and The Lutheran Experience- An Immigrant’s Perspective– on the second and final day of the event.

According to Hunt, her presentation will be based on personal experience and will chronicle some of the many challenges she encountered when she immigrated to the USA from Jamaica after becoming a born again Christian in her native homeland.

“So many people speak of the culture shock that envelops them when they arrive in the US as an immigrant from a region like the Caribbean,” she says. “But the stories that often go untold are those about the spiritual and religious culture shock that many experience as well. For me in particular, after accepting Christ and embracing my faith in Jamaica, I then arrived here only to discover an interesting set of challenges… Namely that many of the religious cultural practices I was used to in Jamaica were completely different in the USA. Accepting and embracing the fact that we are all Christians but may take very different approaches to how we choose to worship was a whole new journey.”

She believes her interactive presentation- which is already one of the most eagerly anticipated at the event- will help attendees form an appreciation for the  need to recognize and be respectful of  the differences between themselves and Christians from other cultures.

For Hunt, her appearance at the high profile event is another step on a remarkable personal and spiritual journey that began in the inner city community of Allman Town in Kingston Jamaica where she was born.

Raised in deep poverty and suffering for many years from the  low self esteem that she says often accompanies being born “ black, female and poor”   in  countries like Jamaica,  she embraced  dual careers in  acting and media, quickly rising to become one of the most popular  and recognizable women in Caribbean entertainment .

At the height of her success, she was the host of two top rated television shows on Jamaica’s TVJ network,  as well as an in demand stage actor moving quickly from one award winning theatrical production to another. This lead to her audition and subsequent casting for her breakthrough role in How Stella Got Her Groove Back.

For all her success however, she felt, in her own words, “Like an imposter…. Like I wasn’t deserving. Something was missing and I couldn’t figure out what. And  I needed to know fast or I thought I was literally going to die.”

She sought help and once she did, things turned around dramatically. She became a born again Christian in 2012 having attained her Fitness Coaching Certification in 2010. Her Certified Life Coaching qualification followed in 2019. She quit acting to focus on physical and mental wellness for both herself and others, which she continues to do at her company SizzleFit Faith and Fitness in Austin, Texas.

It is the blending of her two life passions- faith and fitness- that put her on her path to her upcoming second appearance at the GROW Conference.

In 2018, with no experience and on very short notice, she entered the SCW (formerly Sara’s City Workout) Dallas Mania Idol Competition- a contest among fitness trainers giving presentations – and won.  Already professionally engaged in fitness training with seniors and the elderly at her job, she took that platform and her fitness skills into her church. She subsequently toured much of the southwest USA giving workshops and workout sessions to many seniors in Christian communities and elsewhere, as well as training other fitness professionals to do the same.  Her success and growing reputation attracted the attention of WELS, leading to her first appearance at the GROW conference in 2019 at which she did a lecture fitness presentation targeted at seniors.  The opportunity to present for the second time at this year’s event subsequently followed.

Denise Hunt also hosts Random Thoughts Live every Thursday at 8pm EST on her Instagram site – @denisesizzlefithunt.

Excerpt from the Jamaica Observer column published on Monday, July 19, 2021

By Jean Lowrie-Chin

Last week we cheered our Reggae Boyz as they triumphed over Suriname and Guadeloupe, making their way into the quarter-finals for the Concacaf Gold Cup. They enjoy the keen guidance of Head Coach Theodore “Tappa” Whitmore, who sent us into a state of euphoria with his two goals in the 1998 World Cup. We wish them well in their continued quest this week.

Meanwhile, more of our athletes are making their way to Japan for the Tokyo Olympics, which will have its official opening this Friday. We have high hopes for our stars and aspirants as they compete in the guarded environment of Japan’s state of emergency. There will be no spectators in the stands but we ask them to imagine the loud cheers of their faithful Jamaican fans who will be with them every breathless step of the way.

Excerpt from the Jamaica Observer column published on Monday, July 19, 2021

By Jean Lowrie-Chin

The Jamaica Observer has welcomed back the steady, sharp Julian Richardson as their online content manager; the experienced Dashan Hendricks has been appointed business editor; while ace writer Andrew Laidley has come on board as senior business reporter. Earlier this year, former Advertising Manager Natalie Chin, a veritable dynamo, was appointed deputy managing director. It is great to see our media houses focusing on strengthening their teams — no wonder Jamaica has been in the top ten countries for press freedom for many years.

Excerpt from the Jamaica Observer column published on Monday, July 19, 2021

By Jean Lowrie-Chin

The heaviest rainfall in a century broke the banks of rivers in Germany and Belgium and a dike in Holland, leaving over 120 people dead and scores missing. It was heartbreaking to see the reports of homes being swept away and small business owners, who had just completed preparations for reopening after the COVID-19-related closure, losing their shops to powerful currents. Leaders have ascribed this catastrophe to climate change. We send our sympathy to these members of the European Union, which has been incredibly supportive of Jamaica.

Excerpt from the Jamaica Observer column published on Monday, July 19, 2021

By Jean Lowrie-Chin

Prime Minister Andrew Holness, the youngest Jamaican elected to that office, had an excellent interview with Fox 5 New York host Rosanna Scotto last week, organised by Jamaica Consul General Alsion Wilson. We are grateful to Scotto for her kind words on Jamaica: “I can’t wait to come back and visit — the entertainment, the people, the food, the water, the weather — everything is just about perfect there.” In describing PM Holness, she noted that “through compassionate dialogue and inclusiveness he is ushering in a new generation of transformative development and leadership”.

In response to her question on our state of affairs, Holness reponded, “I’m very proud of the fact that Jamaica has resolved its management of its economic affairs and I believe we are on a very good course, having gone through several IMF [International Monetary Fund] programmes to entrench this kind of fiscal stability and fiscal prudence… We are now on a trajectory for growth… We are creating the environment – regulatory and otherwise… we are also tackling other institutional and development issues, such as strengthening our bureaucracy to deal with things such as corruption but, at the same time, to become more efficient.”

He noted the Administration’s heavy investment in national security through “long-term investments, which will have signal effects on the transformation of our country”. He disclosed that his Government “in a few months… will roll out some transformative policies for the education sector”.

The PM referred to the Government’s work towards containment of COVID-19, explaining our protocols for testing and quarantine and our ‘resilient corridor’ for visitors. “We expect that in August we should have a sufficient supply of vaccines to start widespread and mass vaccinations,” he said.

In response to his thoughts on the situation in Haiti, he remarked, “It saddens me. I knew President Moïse personally… my heart goes out to his wife. I hope she is recovering speedily… We want to see stability and peace for the people of Haiti.”

Excerpt from the Jamaica Observer column published on Monday, July 19, 2021

By Jean Lowrie-Chin

IT was coincidental that just a few days after a relative abroad shared an inspiring YouTube video on national hero and founder of the People’s National Party (PNP) Norman Washington Manley, news came that the chairman and vice-presidents of the party, as well as the president of the PNP Youth Organisation (PNPYO), had resigned from their positions. The video, produced by YeKengalé and featuring interviews with PNP elders PJ Patterson, Burchell Whiteman and Arnold Bertram, spoke of the perseverance and integrity of Norman Manley. They described his collegiality with Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) leader Sir Alexander Bustamante, whom he supported even after his defeat in the 1962 General Election. Significantly, former JLP leader Bruce Golding also spoke of Manley’s dedication to the development of our constitution.

So here we have a political party, founded by this shining Jamaican, now foundering as positions become hardened. The Jamaica Observer‘s lead story on Saturday, July 17 by Arthur Hall noted, “Last month, the party went public with news of its unity push, with the person given the job to lead the charge, former General Secretary Maxine Henry-Wilson, warning the Comrades that without unity the PNP would be in serious trouble.

“ ‘The public can’t believe that you have the capacity to lead if internally you can’t even talk to each other properly. So the work that the party has to do, and is doing, has to be brought to the fore and the disunity has to take a back seat… It is not going to disappear, but we all need to have a larger purpose around which we are revolving,’ Henry-Wilson told the Jamaica Observer.”

Our shop was blessed to serve the then Electoral Advisory Committee led by William Chin See, with membership including Henry-Wilson of the PNP and Ryan Peralto of the JLP. I recall the strong arguments as they discussed revisions to the Representation of the People Act, but with the respect and humour of mature deliberations.

Despite Henry-Wilson’s wise counsel, it seems that the damage has gone too deep to resolve internal differences. Arthur Hall quotes from Krystal Tomlinson’s resignation letter: “I will not continue to serve where there is a wavering commitment to integrity; where parish and region chairmen engineer and facilitate fraudulent behaviour and have the audacity to parade themselves as ‘untouchables’ because of their proximity to the leadership of the party.”

It is a crying shame that such accusations are being levelled at the leaders of the party that Norman Manley built. May they find a way to heal – in the words of the late Edward Seaga when he dealt with a rift in his party, “Light a candle, sing a sankey and find your way back home.”

In the News

In April, the Digicel Foundation launched a grant campaign in partnership with the Digicel dealer stores to identify projects across the island for its micro-grant programme. These ‘20 for 20’ the grants are  valued at $650,000 each and persons can apply through their local dealer stores. The first batch of grant recipients were recently announced, with cheques handed over in Lucea, Portland, Clarendon, Trelawny and Kingston. The first lucky group to receive a cheque was Cacoon Primary and Infant school, which applied through UGs Better Buy – the operator of the Lucea Digicel store.

The school will use the funds to beautify the property and develop a playfield for students. “Our focus is teaching and learning but students will learn better in an environment that feels like a safe haven and is comfortable – they will have that drive to come to school and learn more,” explained Antoinette Riley, principal of the school. “I’m excited because the funding for a school is never adequate – when we can get funding from a corporate entity like the Digicel Foundation it just makes me feel elated.”

In the News

He’s one of the top professional footballers in Europe, a sought-after prospect for several clubs, and a key member of Jamaica’s national senior team. Added to that, he carries the weight of World Cup qualifying on his back.

Yet, Leon Bailey still remembers a time when things were totally different, when he was a far way from the life he now enjoys. Though things were hard and his path to success less clear, Bailey always knew that one day he would be a professional player.

The Phoenix All Stars Football Academy and its holistic approach to developmental training on and off the pitch was the ticket to opportunities which he rode straight to the upper echelons of the sport. Now Bailey, also known as Chippy to his family and close friends, plies his trade with Bayern Leverkusen in the German Bundesliga and is set to fly to Orlando to join his Jamaican teammates to challenge for this year’s Gold Cup.

A strong, dedicated and coordinated partnership between Leon Bailey and Food For The Poor (FFP) is expected to raise the roof, or better yet, put a roof over the heads of many Jamaicans in need.

During a courtesy visit to FFP’s offices in Spanish Town and accompanied by Phoenix Sports Management President Craig Butler and fellow professional footballer, Ricardo Martin (now on vacation from his club duties at Senglea FC in Malta), Leon renewed his commitment to FFP to support, assist and use his voice and influence as a medium to garner more help for the charity’s many initiatives.

“I remember what it was like to be in need and to be helped to achieve my daily and long-term goals, so I am extremely happy to support the initiatives of this noble organisation and to help as best as I can,” he said.

BETTER JAMAICA

Those sentiments were echoed by Butler, who developed and raised Bailey from childhood to his current status and continues to guide the footballer. “We are cognisant of the impact a little support can have in the life of a human being and we will continue to acknowledge and support Food For The Poor as we build together a united, better Jamaica, one action at a time.”

Through his own charity, the Leon Bailey Foundation, Bailey has partnered with FFP to provide the children of the Nest Children’s Home (an FFP-supported institution) with computer tablets to aid their online learning.

As FFP Executive Director Craig Moss-Solomon points out, a significant benefit of the partnership is derived from Bailey’s visibility, influence and reach.

“Through his excellence as an international footballer, Bailey opens up avenues for other athletes, both locally and overseas, to get involved, as well as other individuals outside the sporting arena. We appreciate the support from the entire Phoenix family, and we look forward to the fruits that will be produced from this partnership, as we work together to uplift those in need.”

He added that the partnership with Bailey will be hugely impactful in several areas of ministry. “Just in the area of housing, FFP receives at least 100 requests each month, with each home typically accommodating four persons, so providing a home is helping to keep a family safe, and that has significant ripple effects.”

Excerpt from the Jamaica Observer column published Monday, July 05, 2021

By Jean Lowrie-Chin

Our society is wounded, and the first place to start the healing must be the home. Justices of the Peace islandwide were called on by Justice Minister Delroy Chuck to engage communities in the prevention of child abuse at last Thursday’s online discussion. Children’s Advocate Diahann Harrison, Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA) Head Rosalee Gage-Grey and Centre for Investigation of Sexual Offences & Child Abuse (CISOCA) Head SSP Charmaine Shand walked us through the rights of children and the responsibility of adults to ensure their safety.

Mrs Harrison noted that Jamaica ratified the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child (1989) as early as 1991, highlighting four areas of focus: survival, protection, developmental, and participatory (ever grateful for her helpful slides). She gave details on the categories: Survival Rights, the right to life, shelter, food and clothing; Developmental, right to spiritual & moral guidance, an education, reasonable health services, consistent with the age and needs of the child. Protection Rights demand the establishment of policies, practice, legislative framework to ensure children are protected – Jamaica’s Child Care and Protection Act (CCPA) is indeed a model; and Participatory, the right to participate in the decision-making process in matters that may impact upon him or her. 

The right to participate took me back to an account of Bob Marley’s childhood in his biography ‘Catch A Fire’ by Timothy White. White reports that as a small child, Bob was taken from his home by his father Norval to live with the Marley family in Kingston. Cedella Booker saw in this the promise of a better life for her son.  However, instead of staying with them in the Hillcrest area, he was sent to live with a Miss Grey on Heywood Street in downtown Kingston. Ms Booker was distressed that her letters enquiring about her child remained unanswered. A relative spotted the six-year-old buying coal on Spanish Town Road. He begged her for his mother, who subsequently went in frantic search of her son. When she found him, little Bob hugged her crying, “Mumma! Why yuh nuh come look fe me?” She took him back to her family homestead in Nine Miles, St. Ann.

The Children’s Advocate emphasised that any incident or even suspicion of child abuse must be reported, noting that the Children’s Registry in the CPFSA will receive reports of child abuse confidentially at 1-888-PROTECT (1-888-776-8328), after which they will be referred to partner agencies. She noted that the CCPA requires that “any person who has information which causes him to suspect that a child’s right has been infringed, or a child is at risk or in a vulnerable situation” has a “mandatory obligation to report as soon as is reasonably practicable.”

She listed the consequences of not reporting: liable for prosecution; summary criminal proceedings in the Parish Court; maximum penalty of $500,000 fine or six months imprisonment (or combination of both) and penalties also for making false statements.

Since 2007, there has been a yearly increase in the number of children reported as being abused. She said girls continue to be more at risk compared to boys and data shows that the number of abuses taking place right there in the child’s home, is double those that happen at the offender’s location.

The Covid pandemic has also had an emotional impact on children, as revealed by a UNICEF survey of 505 homes. These include boredom (63%), over-eating (57%), frustration (41%), clinginess (39%), anxiety (23%), sadness (23%), fear (21%) and uncooperativeness (15%).  Mrs Harrison appealed to us to get ‘back to basics’: have ‘simple but important conversations about morals and values, and a sense of caring’, focus on supporting parenting activities and working with children in nearby communities.

The launch of “Safe Spot” co-sponsored by UNICEF and private sector bodies, is imminent – a 24-hour child and teen helpline which is toll free and will be manned by qualified professionals. There are several ways that children can reach Safe Spot – call 888-SAFE-SPOT (888-733-3776), WhatsApp 876-439-5199 or DM on Instagram @safespotja. Charmaine Daniels, CEO of Digicel Jamaica Foundation, a co-sponsor of “Safe Spot”, describes it as “a Godsend for Jamaica’s children”. I hope fellow JPs will share this information far and wide as there are children who in need or urgent help.

Excerpt from the Jamaica Observer column published Monday, July 05, 2021

By Jean Lowrie-Chin

We give props to ODPEM, our Met Office and the Ministry of Local Government for helping us track and prepare for Hurricane Elsa over the past days. However, as the old saying goes, “God helps those who help themselves” and too many of us are casual about putting ourselves in order, and quick to blame ‘the Govament’ when we are affected.

At the time of writing this column, thankfully we have been downgraded from ‘Hurricane Warning’ to “Tropical Storm Warning’ – still serious as this comes with a great deal of wind and rain.

We have been specially focused on the elderly as they should have a stock of prescription meds in addition to the usual necessities.  Family members should remember that a sad aspect of elderly abuse is neglect.  They may have been energetic in their time but age has its challenges and dear Grandma and Grandpa do need more support. Please do not wait until the last minute to help them prepare for emergencies; visit at least monthly and check on their supplies.

Many younger relatives live abroad but there are trusted neighbours, church family and friends who you can engage to help you do a physical check. Remember some elders try not to bother their children, so if you do not get in-person checks done you may not know their true situation. There are inexpensive camera systems that can also assist you to monitor wherever you are.

As the National Works Agency tries to keep abreast of road repairs, Parish Councils should ensure that new builds are in accessible areas. Rural folks are suffering from terrible road conditions, with the authorities trying to play catch-up. There is so much potential in every parish in our beautiful country – let us get a handle on our built environment so we do not have the population overload in some places and sparse, struggling communities in others.