Assistant pastor revealed to be a cow thief

Months after being appointed as an assistant pastor at a Pentecostal church, a man says he was stripped of his position after it emerged that he stole four cows in October 2023 - an act that left him without four fingers.

Michael* said he committed the theft just three months before he gave his life to God, but the truth behind his injury resurfaced last year, ultimately leading to his removal from the church.

"I tried to leave that part of my life behind, but it never really left me," he said. "It followed me right into the place I thought I was starting over."

Michael does not attempt t0 hide his injuries - three fingers from his left hand and one from his right are gone. For a time, he said, no one questioned his 'deformity'. He admitted that he and two other men stole four heads of cattle from a farmer in Trelawny.

"I was working off information given to me by my cousin and him a someone we always involved in things like these," he said. Praedial larceny is a serious issue in Jamaica, causing significant financial losses for farmers and threatening the sustainability of the agricultural sector.

"It wasn't something that just happened, I went there knowing what I was going to do," Michael told THE WEEKEND STAR. He said that two days after taking the animals, men connected to the owner found him in his community.

"There was a confrontation. I even remember denying it and that's where things escalated and got physical." By the end of it, four fingers were gone.

"I knew it had gone too far," he said. "But there was nothing I could do at that point." The matter, he said, ended there. "No police, no report."

By the following summer, Michael said he made a decision to change.

"What happened forced me to sit with myself in a way I never had before," he said. "I realised the life I was living was going to destroy me if I didn't walk away from it and I'm disappointed it had to come to losing four fingers." He enrolled in a theological college, and joined the church in December 2024. Last November, he was appointed as one of the assistant pastors. Michael said church leaders never questioned him about the circumstances surrounding his injury, nor did he tell them.

"I was ashamed. I didn't want to bring that into the life I was trying to live," he admitted. For a while, that silence held. But after his appointment, he said he began to notice a shift.

"You could feel it," he said. "The way people looked at me changed." As rumours spread through the community, details of the theft resurfaced and eventually reached the church.

"Before long, people started calling me 'thieving Barabbas' and even 'pastor penitent'," he said. Early last month, he said he was "kicked out" of the church.

"One minute they told me it's best not to come back." He has not returned since. Michael said he understands why people feel how they do, and while he is not condoning his crime, he knows the person he is trying to become.

"It really is not just stealing, it's taking away people's survival. It is wrong. Ephesians 4:28 says, 'Let the thief steal no longer but rather let him labour doing honest work with his own hands'. And that's exactly what I was trying to do by converting. I never meant to offend anybody with my past."

*Name changed to protect identity