Letter of the Day | Together We Rise, a monument that heals

THE EDITOR, Madam:

One year after Hurricane Melissa ravaged parts of western Jamaica, the 62-foot sculpture Together We Rise now stands courageously on Montego Bay’s Jimmy Cliff Boulevard. Commissioned by Christopher Issa of S Hotels and created by sculptor Scheed Cole, it deserves far more than admiration. It invites a national reflection.

National trauma does not end with the start of physical reconstruction. Grief lingers as the body bears the scars of trauma long after the debris is cleared. Art, the creativity of the human spirit, gives that anguish a shape we can look at, name and share. By weaving storm debris into the monument, some of it handed over by survivors with their stories, Cole has turned wreckage into a testimonial witness. Jamaicans can stand in awe before it and say: this happened to us, and we are still here.

self-giving love

The monument is a sermon. An elderly woman lifts a baby upwards, surrendering herself for the sake of the future. A soldier reaches out to grasp a woman willing to let go. These images speak of self-giving love and of a God who does not abandon suffering humanity but reaches out through human hands. As the figures rise from despair towards a Tree of Life bearing 14 healing plants, one for each parish, we remember Scripture’s promise that the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations (Revelation 22:2). Hope, faith and charity are never solitary virtues. We proceed together, or we do not rise at all.

Its kinship with Laura Facey’s Redemption Song in Emancipation Park, Kingston is unmistakable. There, two figures rise from the water, faces lifted heavenward, free after centuries of painful bondage. Here, figures rise from floodwaters, lifting one another. Both works declare that Jamaica’s story is defined not by its wounds but by its rising.

Issa exemplifies something our national leaders would do well to emulate. Recovery is not simply about concrete, steel and zinc. A nation must also be rebuilt in its mind and heart. Public art and national monuments belong in any serious recovery plan, alongside counselling and community assistance, because they restore memory, dignity and meaning.

I commend Issa, who chose the monument’s height to honour 1962, and Cole for this gift to the nation. I hope other private-sector leaders and NaRRa will follow their example by investing not only in buildings but also in Jamaica’s soul.

Fr Donald Chambers

Frdon63@hotmail.com