Emmanuel Apostolic celebrates Palm Sunday with new centenarians

Palm Sunday 2024 was not celebrated in its usual fashion at the Emmanuel Apostolic Church on Slipe Road in Kingston over the weekend.

In addition to celebrating the Christian belief in the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem - when He was greeted by cheering crowds waving palm branches that they set out on the ground along his path - the congregation also took time to recognise two church members who have lived to see their 100th birthdays.

One centenarian, Adora Cameron, was in church for the grand celebration while the church family visited the other member, David Wilmot Davis, at his home in Vineyard Town, Kingston.

While praises went up in celebration for the life of Cameron, she did one thing. That was raising her hands in thanksgiving before listening to words of appreciation from her family members, relatives, church family, and friends.

“I feel proud, proud because the Lord kept me. It’s not me keep miself. The Lord kept me right, so although I cannot walk strong, I feel proud, proud, proud,” Cameron told The Gleaner.

She stressed that she was extremely grateful to celebrate her 100th birthday in the “house of the Lord” at Emmanuel Apostolic.

“If I don’t come to church, I don’t feel good. My daughter can tell you, and as early as possible, I get up all 3:00 a.m. in the morning to reach Sunday school and service,” the centenarian said.

After saying this, her daughter, Beulah Newland Richards, nodded her head in agreement.

“Knowing my mother over the past years, she’s always a God-fearing person. She’s been a Christian for some 40-plus years. She’s always into her church and for her children, she always tells us that she has 12 children, but right now, it’s only four of us [who are] alive, and she has 12 grandchildren and five great grandchildren, and for her to be 100 years old, I’m so proud of it,” Newland Richards told The Gleaner.

“Sometimes I sit and I wonder, and I say 100 years on the Earth with her, and it’s [only] since she fell the other day that she is not walking good. But right through the time, even with arthritis pain, she was walking, but we give God the glory. Great things He hath done [for her],” she said.

STRICT MOTHER

Newland Richards said that even at 100 years, Cameron is still a strict mother who instructs them to pray and read their Bibles, especially before going to bed and before leaving home for work.

Another of the centenarian’s daughters, Pearlena Cameron Barnaby, chimed in and said, “She is a disciplined person, and as a matter of fact, she never had a mother because her mother went to Cuba at a tender age, and she grew with her uncle ... . She’s a creative person. She’s a visionary. She is a masterpiece. She is faithful to church. She was baptised here on a Sunday, the 24th, as today.”

Cameron said that when she was young, she wanted to pursue a career in law, but her parents were not around to support her, so she turned to entrepreneurship and working in a factory.

“She did dressmaking and all of our (her children’s) clothes, before we became adults, were sown by her. She would sew our uniforms, our church dresses, my brother’s pants and shirts, and she loved to bake. She would bake her ginger bread, bulla, etc,” Cameron Barnaby said.

Cameron’s most remarkable attribute, that Cameron Barnaby praises, is that the centenarian was “always a giver” to her fellowmen.

“She is very kind. Even when she used to go to the market, people downtown would say, ‘Your mother is a God-sent person’. People down there, who I don’t know, said she would come here and bring breakfast for us, water, load herself and carry it in the market. My mother would give [to] all walks of life,” she said.

Cameron proudly recalled that she was born on March 24, 1924, in Trelawny before migrating to Kingston.

In the meantime, Davis was happy to see his youngest daughter, Paula Clarke, grandchildren, and church family members on Sunday, following on the heels of a birthday party held on Saturday night in recognition of his special milestone.

When asked how he felt to welcome his 100th birthday, the ailing centenarian briefly said: “I feel all right. I have a lot to give God thanks for. Feeling pains, but it’s a part of old age,” he briefly told The Gleaner.

For his daughter, it was amazing for her dad to still have his mental capabilities in tact, and being alive, albeit ailing a bit.

“It’s just an honour to mark this significant occasion with dad. God has kept him. He has gone through a lot. He’s seen a lot. He’s experienced a lot, and he has a lot to share. He has been an inspiration to all his children – he’s got nine [children] – and a hard worker [and] a dedicated man of God and gave his life to the Lord at a very early age, and a really hard believer in the word of God. And he has influenced his children, his grandchildren, and his great grandchildren,” she said.

ainsworth.morris@gleanerjm.com