AUGUST 5, 2019  (from July 24, 2019)

It is now  the 7^th of August. (The way to hell is paved with good intentions they say.)

On the 26^th of July, we celebrated the Jubilees of  5 of our members of the community---60 years. Of vows 2, 50 yrs. as priest, 1, 25 yrs. as priest, 2, one of them our Superior General who lives at our headquarters in Rome but is a local boy. He also celebrated at home and his mom was thrilled to death.

One day I went to the hospital and when  I tried to start the car to go home, the key wouldn’t  turn in the ignition. A mechanic friend sent some of his crew who took  the thing apart and got the car started so I could get it to their garage (Very close to  home ). R420 for new ignition fixture and R300 for labor. Ouch. I hadn’t budgeted for that.

I have been at Savannah Park for about 5 times now and feel comfortable there, but there was always another priest there to assist me in case I decided to fall down or faint or whatever. Ha. I did lose my balance once and was caught by the other priest while the people were gasping. Otherwise, I am managing but sometimes, in my own room, I move around like a drunk monkey, for bed to table to desk to sink to wall, looking for some support. It would make a great cartoon film.

We have started back at the hospital again on Tuesdays and Thursdays, 6am. I fetch Sister from the convent at 5:30 and she gets the portable altar prepared. As long as I have something to lean on I am ok. The spasms keep coming but I just absorb them and move on. But after sitting or lying for a while, when I get up the spasm goes into action and it is as though I have to start learning how to walk all over again from scratch. After a few minutes, I am able to move around ok with  my beloved elbow crutch. Not too many come at that hour of the morning (2 to 5 people) but the chapel is fairly well used by lots of people who come to pray in this quiet place, not just catholics but Hindus and anyone.

I was asked by a family I have known for over 45 yrs. to celebrate a funeral mass for one of the deceased members o the family. Luckily the two altar servers (one young man and one young woman) were there to catch me twice when I tripped going up the stairs. Ha. Again, people were gasping.

I accepted the offer of a friend who is and Oblate of Mary Immaculate (OMI) ( we tease them and say that the OMI stands for Old Men’s Institute). To come and spend time (an over nightery) at their place in Hilton, not far from the seminary where most of the students from various religious communities study. We grabbed a lunch with the students and their teachers ( nice fish and chips---it was Friday) . A rainbow nation of people from Zambia, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Nigeria and other countries in Africa.

On Monday, 5^th of August, I saw a dentist (Dr. Lloyd Nundeekasen) who repaired a tooth that was falling apart.

But on Tuesday, while I was reading the gospel at the Mass at the hospital, the repaired tooth came apart and I took a big part of it out of my mouth and just kept on reading. I wonder what people thought.

After the hospital mass I had a group of 9^th graders coming for a mass (they go to a Catholic school—Holy Family School) but only 3 out of the 20 or so kids were catholic. The main thing is to convince them that it is worthwhile to listen to the readings from the scriptures which give hints and clues as to what God is expecting of us in our context today. Different words will strike different people and will help them to make a plan for their lives for that day. At least that is what I hope. Many, of course, have already opted out of any kind of religious commitment, even though they all, I think and hope, would like to be good people—honest, caring, faithful, compassionate, etc.

Because I was so slow with my crutch, I didn’t have a chance to interact with the kids outside of the church scene. (someone grabbed me immediately after the mass and I had to focus on that one and let the kids and their leader go without even saying good bye. Not good.

I have finished my financial report for July and will take it to Br. Tendai. I will also have finished this blog today.

I went to the dentist after the kids mass and he removed the rest of the tooth that was above ground and then just patched up what was left (the parts of the tooth that were above the gum level he removed. The root is still there and he just covered it up so that nothing goes in to  cause an infection.

We have been watching the circus around the mass shootings in the states and Trump trying to find any way around putting the blame on the easy availability of automatic weapons as the prime cause of these regularly occurring mass shootings now. What is wrong with these conservative Americans who can’t see that automatic weapons are not for normal home use or hunting ( can you imagine what a deer looked like after you blasted it with an automatic weapon) but are for WAR.

I wonder how the American farmers are doing now and some other businesses. It would seem that it would make more sense to sit down and dialogue a bit and come to a mutual understanding and not just slap tariffs all over the place without thinking of the broader effects on others besides the targeted people.

 

But enough for now. Have a great week. Love and Peace,  Cas

By the way, I have some new medication to control my blood pressure (mild hypertension). I realized that the spasms didn’t start immediately after the knee op---I don’t remember them while I was in the hospital, and I didn’t take my medication with med to the hospital but only re-started to use it when I got back home, which, I think, is when the spasms started. So we abandoned that brand and are trying another brand but, so far—2 days---I don’t notice any difference, e.g. the spasms continue as usual. That‘s life.