Fr Abner the faithful priest

THE ANGLICAN Church recently lost the services of the Rev Canothe All Saints Cure of Souls. All Saints Anglican Church, West Street, was the spiritual home of my paternal grandaunts, Athaliah and Ruth Medley, and aunt, Pauline Skinner. He also served as chaplain to my late grandmother, Agatha McLean, who spent her final years under his care when she moved from Clarendon to live with her daughter and sibling in the 1990s.

For many years, Fr Powell entrust me the task of preparing the liturgies that marked the significant events of Kingston College, his 36 years of ordination to the diaconate and 60 birthday in June 2009, where I penned these words, “... and grant unto Abner who celebrates 60 years of life on this day, health and your n Abner Powell, who died on November 24. Canon Powell’s ministry began in 1973, when he was ordained with the late Robert Thompson (former Bishop of Kingston) and Archbishop of the West Indies, Howard Gregory, as deacons.

My encounter with Canon Powell is connected with his ministry as rector of divine shalom, and that he may minister to your household as a true servant of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord…”.

Canon Powell remained committed to his call as a faithful priest. Indeed, the words of God from the prophet Malachi to Levi is a worthy epithet: “My covenant with Him was a covenant of life and well-being, which I gave him; this called for reverence, and he revered me and stood in awe of my name. True instruction was in his mouth, and no wrong was found on his lips. He walked with me in integrity and uprightness, and he turned many from iniquity. For the lips of a priest should guard knowledge, and people should seek instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts” (2:5-7).

Fr Powell was an enabler of nurturing spiritual gifts of members of the community of faith, and those outside. He was fearless, as his work took him among both warring political and gang feuds within the Cure. He was an educator who sought to empower the poor.

One of his unfulfilled desires was to retire and move to his house in Mandeville. His commitment to the welfare and well-being of the All Saints Cure caused him to remain until he was called to higher service in the paradise of God. May he who walked among the poor and dispossessed, leading the people of God in prayer, worship and acts of liberation, be given a place in the Liturgy of Heaven. Condolences to his family.