April  26, 2020

Time to update. I find that using the cell phone more and more, the tw0 thumb thing, I am losing my typing skills. Ha.

We had no Easter Vigil service this year. First time I missed, I think Ever! Strange feeling. They had something In the monastery but because there are two others who can’t move that far, rather than let them feel that they are abandoned, Two of us stayed behind to keep them company ( in the spirit of Easter)’

We had the Easter mass at 9am on Easter Sunday. I was hoping that our Fr. Proud (Jonathan) could find some time to come and do some counselling to my computer and printer as they seem to be refusing to talk to each other. This has gone on for a couple of weeks now. Fr. Proud is our local computer guru. He has managed to fix everything so far whenever I have a problem.

It is now the 28^th. I was lazy in between or just didn’t want to head over to the monastery where I needed a signal to get this blog going on the internet.

On Easter the superiors from the monastery came to pay us a visit here at MD (Mater Dolorosa), the abandoned ones.  Nice of them. We had a 9am Easter Mass here at MD, but no Easter Vigil, Christ the Light. It felt strange that something important was missing.

For a couple of days there was a lot of rain, and it is badly needed,,

On the 25^th, I took Fr. Urs to the monastery to show him how to get onto the internet. It had been weeks that he had no way of communicating. I told his to just use the battery of his computer. For the short time he would be on the internet. His computer is old and we discovered that his battery was as dead as common sense. What is the next move. He has the wherewithal and should invest in a new computer.

   One day the left wing of my glasses came off.  I wanted to glue it back on but I had loaned my glue to someone and it was gone. I wasn’t allowed to buy some at the store (when I went to get my yoghurt) because it is not an absolute necessity like food. My neighbor, Bishop Lobinger loaned me his and I succeeded in putting it back together.

Someone in a message said I should get Zoom so we can see each other when we communicate. I think I downloaded it but don’t know how to use it. Don’t laugh

On the Friday after Easter, among other things, we had prunes for dessert. Just what I need for my chronic constipation. But it was a once off and the next day they were gone, it seems, forever.

Fr. Proud came over at the end of the week and got my computer and printer talking to each other again. A simple. He just cleaned off the electric terminals on the ink cartridge and it was like the Holy Spirit blowing new life into a person. He also got me a way to top up my mobile router in case it runs out of juice before the end of the month. Hooray. Good ending to the first week after Easter.

Monday, April 20. BP 161/76   Wed. 22,  BP  152/72.   I think I am pretty healthy, all except for these bloody spasms. Ai swear they can calculate. They will let you in peace for a certain time ( lying down or sitting) but as soon as you get up, you pay dearly for the favor….There will be a wild spasm in direct proportion to the length of time they left you in peaaaace.

    On the 24^th, I took my first trip to the pharmacy to get a refill on my BP pills and a few other things. Also put some petrol in the tank in case one of us old timers decided to surprise us with an episode, we will be ready to take him to help, without fear of running out of petrol on the way. This is called “ forward thinking’. Learned from experience.

  I have spent hours on Google, trying to decipher Skype’s web page so that I could change my credit card information. Hopeless. Then a notice comes from Skype to remind me that my contract will end at the end of the month if I haven’t updated my credit card info. Ha. Then they said to go to such and such a place and then press “account”. Well, that sounded a bit too easy and  I was right. However when ai went to such and such a place, there was no “account’ (I knew that was going to be the case) but I went here and there and eventually manage to put in the new information, without any help from Skype. It is important that I continue with Skype because I use it to phone people, like my Uncle Cas, who is 92, and has macular degeneration and it is the only way to communicate with him now. Also, there are others who don’t have Skype (Skype to Skype is free) and I can use the good rates from Skype (2 cents a minute to the States or Europe)

And I can’t afford normal phone charges.

A friend from the UK sent some money to my socio-pastoral account, and now my brother too, so that I have been able to help lots of people with money to buy food and pay rents and other bills during this lockdown when no one can work and when many literally live from hand to mouth. No money today, no eat today

So for all of you who have contributed to this fund, I pass on their thanks to you. I keep telling them that it isn’t my money but I will tell those who made it possible, that you send your thanks and appreciation. That’s it for now. I will get this on the internet this afternoon.  Someone said that if you have everything but don’t have jesus, ( or some higher power besides yourself) you are a real loser.   Love and peace and patience and determination and hope during these challenging times.     Fr. Cas

April, 10, 2020

It is Good Friday, and this is the strangest  Holy Week of my life. No normal services. On Monday, 6^th, I did my little laundry and managed to find the key to get to the outside and hang my clothes out on the line outside where they could dry nicely in the hot sun. On Tuesday, I finished the job by doing the ironing. I was prepared to go to the pharmacy to pick up some medical things but Bishop Paul Khumalo did it for me. I am grateful for that. He is the one who is out almost every day in charge of the buying of the things we need for every day stuff here in the house so he goes from one shop to the other till he can find one that has what we need. There are still crowds of people who ignore the order to stay at home, but it is understandable that many eat from hand to mouth and have to go each day as they don’t have enough money to buy in bulk.

Wed. I tried, unsuccessfully to contact Time Magazine and Skype to give them the new details of my renewed Credit Card. Hopeless. They keep shunting you from one site to the next and want to give you a deal on a new subscription….everything but what you want. In two or three days, I spent hours on the internet to no avail. I finally gave up and said just to cancel the subscription.

Holy Thursday, 5 of us old timers celebrated the mass of the last supper together. One is blind, two others can’t hear, and three of us did the readings. No foot washing. Ha. None of us could bend down to wash our own feet much less someone else’s. But it was meaningful.

Good Friday, only two of us came together to do the Stations of the Cross. The others decided to do their own thing in their rooms. Looking after the homeless and those afflicted by the virus are the ways of doing the foot washing this year.

When I went to the monastery to get the internet, I heard a commotion outside my window, that got my attention. When I pushed aside the drapes, I saw a man lying on the ground surrounded by young men with sticks and among them were some of our students who are staying at the monastery now because their school is closed.

Each time he tried to get up they beat him with the sticks. I presumed that he was caught stealing. I was woyndering if I should go out and tell them that this is not the way Jesus would solve the problem but, being white, with all the left overs of apartheid, I figured that they would probably tell me to get lost, the time for taking orders from a white man are over now. But I was ashamed that the members of our religious community joined them in their scolding the man, if not actually beating him, and approved of his being beaten.

    I talked to one of these young seminarians and he said that it was right to beat him so that when he went back to the village with all the bruises, etc.  the others would see what happens to thieves if they want to steal, especially from the monastery. I couldn’t convince him that I was sure that this is not the way Jesus would have solved the problem.

    I know that it is useless to call the police because they will keep him overnight, maybe even beat him themselves, and then release him the next day so that he can go back to his stealing again. But I am still convinced that this is not the way Jesus would have solved the problem.

It is Holy Saturday today and we won’t be having the Sat. Evening service with Christ the Light, the fire and the Easter Candle. We will only celebrate Jesus triumph over sin and death tomorrow morning at the Easter morning mass.

You are all in our prayers during this trying time. Many has lost hope. Easter joy and hope are irrelevant for them, they think. They need money to buy food and medicine, etc. but they are not allowed to go to work….a real dilemma. And the lockdown has been extended another three weeks.

We pray for each other these days and try to help and support one another as best we can during these very difficult times.

I still say Happy Easter under the present circumstances. The virus has stirred up a lot of love that was sitting idle in our spirits and we thank God for that while we pray for wisdom and courage to go along with our love to guide us as to what to do.

Love and Peace, as always,   Fr. Cas.

April 4, 2020

Like most of you, we have been on lockdown for almost 2 weeks now and are supposed to go till April 16^th (I expect that it will be extended for another period of time since this thing keeps growing and growing and growing. Although people have mostly been ibeying, the main super markets are full every day.

   Before the lockdown I had masses as usual at the hospital and at Savannah Park. The first ones to ask me not to come were the Sisters or Saint Mother Theresa, as they were warned not to have services. The rules have gone out both by the government and by the church authorities saying no church services (mostly masses which many can catch on TV), so my last mass at Savannah Park was on Sunday the 15^th of march (we snuck in a home mass for the Pillay family since they are the ones who do all the organizing---plus a few other active members).  I went out once to a family who was celebrating the 75^th birthday of one of their members. It was taking a chance as we were many in one room, but…. Luckily we all survived, as far as I know.

I went out to a supermarket near us to get some yoghurt and liver spread for emergency snacks. Ha. Empty shelves. I waited two days and went back and luckily got the last two plain yoghurts but no liver spread. Ai didn’t know that so many people are into plain yoghurt---mostly strawberry or something sweet.

We have mass here every morning, us old guys---only three celebrating at the altar, the others just there, either blind or deaf. Ha. Not very lively.

I am scourged with chronic constipation and it got so bad one day I went to our hospital , St. Mary’s (now government but they all know me as the chaplain who refuses to give up) and asked for a dynamite pill. Ha. Instead one of the nurses I know well offered to give me an enema. Well, it is good that I have been through so many experiences so far in my life that I can’t be embarrased any more. It more or less did the job and I could start again from scratch.

    Our wifi was hit by lightening so we were without access to the internet for at least two weeks. No way to reply to others who want to know how we are surviving. Finally it was repaired at the beginning of this week so I can go over to the monastery once a day and hook into the part that was repaired and do some essential things, like catching up.

     All the help by us and the monastery have been put on leave, including Sr. Maria, the cook. The novices are filling in with lots of things including cooking lunches and suppers. They are actually doing quite well. None of us has even thought of dying from food poisoning or starvation. Ora et labora.

    All the Holy Week services will be at the monastery but here at MD (Mater Dolorosa) we have Fr. Macarius who is mostly blind, Fr. Dominic is somewhere in his dememtia . Bishop Lobinger who can still see but not enough to read, Fr. Urs who is able to hear and read but is not so mobile. And then there is me, hobble-along Cas with my crutch. So we decided to do our own thing here at MD since some would not be able to get to the monastery and would be left here to die of spiritual starvation.