Most Reverend Professor Emmanuel Kwaku Asante
Presiding Bishop of Methodist Church Ghana, Most Reverend Professor Emmanuel Kwaku Asante has called on Ghanaians to encounter the past and the future with the view of charting a course for the future and build a firm foundation that was laid by our formers.
He disclosed during an address at the 2015 Metho-Fest held in the Brong Ahafo Regional capital, Sunyani, that the past has a story to tell the present generation so there’s the need to make strands for the future by facilitating an encounter between the present and the past.
He said it’s a time for us as a nation to confront our origins and be mindful on how we build on the achievements of the past.
“Our fore-fathers and fore-mothers have something to the us in-terms of what they did–we also believe that we build on a firm foundation laid by our formers and that will help to build an edifice for the future.”
He noted that the Metho-Fest is intended to remind us at the need to preserve our heritage that was won by our fathers.
“Indeed it says the same thing to us in-terms of the heritage our fathers in Ghana have won for us; it tells us that we need to eschew the tendency to destroy our traditions and heritage in the name of of modernity.”
According to him, we are leaving at a time when we don’t even think about the toils of our fathers and mothers.
“In Ghana, we do not even take photographs of our old buildings when upgrading them or when building what we term as modern, but when I went Rome, you can see buildings with from different levels foundations, with layers telling you the time it was built.”
Prof. Asante added that the history of our churches and country should remind us that we also have a lot to do for our present day.
He explained that, “the category of ancient and and modernity are relative because the ancient was nothing but what was considered modern yesterday; and modern is nothing but tomorrow’s ancient.”
He further stated that any authentic modernity must have evolved from the ancient and nothing such but the evolution of the old.
He urged Ghanaians to let the pass of our forefathers influence us to serve the present generation in view of the future.
