National Cathedral a Misplaced Priority

I didn’t want to speak about the National Cathedral controversy, but sometimes we must be a voice of reason. Religious issues are sensitive, and if we allow them to cloud our sense of judgment, we may fail to see anything wrong even when the facts are clear.

Is the National Cathedral a good initiative? Yes. But is it a priority at this time? Absolutely not.

It is heartbreaking that we live in a nation fixated on building a cathedral while ignoring the unemployment crisis confronting us. Thousands of graduates are at home without jobs, and recently, we witnessed the tragic incident where desperate young people rushed for military recruitment an event that sadly resulted in loss of lives.

Instead of urging the government to invest in factories across our districts to address unemployment, some continue to advocate for a cathedral. How many people will the cathedral employ compared to allocating even two million dollars per district to create jobs? The lack of employment has contributed significantly to the growing drug abuse among the youth. Unemployment is not only a burden on families it is a major threat to national security.

We must prioritize job creation over building churches. At the end of the day, most crimes are not triggered by the absence of a church but by the absence of opportunity.

If the cathedral is truly that important, then I urge the Christian Council to own the project and finance it themselves. Many churches in Ghana have the resources or can develop fundraising mechanisms to build it. We did not elect a president to build a cathedral; we elected leaders to implement policies and projects that will directly improve the lives of citizens.

We are still battling healthcare challenges such as the “no bed” syndrome, poor road infrastructure, children schooling under trees, homelessness, unsafe drinking water, and pervasive unemployment. In such a climate, prioritizing a cathedral over these pressing needs is a profound misjudgment.

God Himself would choose job creation over a cathedral. The days of turning factories into church buildings and placing religion above critical national issues must end. I am a Christian and a minister of the gospel, but focusing on a cathedral in these turbulent times of youth unemployment is not only misplaced; it is a cardinal sin.

The cathedral may be a good idea, but it is not a priority.

- Richard Tawiah