Don’t blame God for coronavirus woes – Palmer-Buckle

Metropolitan Archbishop of Cape Coast, His Grace Archbishop Charles Gabriel Palmer-Buckle has dispelled assumptions that the outbreak of the Novel Coronavirus is a divine punishment on humans in order to cause a change in lifestyles.

To many religious people around the world, the coronavirus is the creator’s own way of punishing humans for mistreating the environment and living erroneous lifestyles but contrary to these assumptions, Archbishop Charles Gabriel Palmer-Buckle believes humans are rather to blame for causing a global pandemic.

According to the clergyman, the disease which was detected in 2019 could have been contained and handled more effectively if humans had heeded to health precautions at the initial stages.

He said the widespread of the disease should rather be blamed on the frequent and unrestricted movement of people from one place to the other.

While speaking on Citi TV’s Point of View, monitored by GhanaWeb, he said, “…if you ask me if it is God’s doing, I will say…its spread worldwide is human. The virus has been there always but as to becoming an epidemic and a pandemic, it is because we human beings have helped in spreading it because of our travel here and there.”

He explained further explained, “I will like to believe that God is not responsible for these things. He created us in his own image and likeliness and he has endowed us with abilities to be able to handle what is happening and to do what we can intellectually, physically, materially even emotionally but he also does not want us to forget the spiritual dimension of everything.”

Ghana like other countries across the globe has not been spared from the deadly claws of the virus as the country over the past month has recorded 566 cases with eight deaths.

Several preventive measures have over the past month been laid out by government all in a bid to curb the spread and subsequently eradicate the disease.

Notable amongst them was the declaration of a national day of fasting and prayers on March 25, 2020, to seek divine intervention at a time the country had only recorded about 27 cases with 2 deaths.