Feb. 17, 2021

 South Africa will distribute unused doses of the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine to other African nations after a small trial failed to show that the vaccine could prevent mild or moderate cases caused by the local variant of the virus.  (good news, sharing, not wasting)

 

L’Opzione di Dio is, of course, a terribly misleading representation of the Catholic Church. For every Machiavellian prelate willing to stop at nothing to attain power – and, make no mistake, such figures aren’t entirely fictional – there’s probably a hundred quietly heroic missionaries, and pastors, and nuns, and lay activists, all pouring out their lives to serve the vulnerable and forgotten people of the world.

Feb. 20, 2021

Just a few words about what is coming. First, the government has relaxed, a bit, the restrictions of the lockdown, so that church services are allowed again, but not more than 50 inside and 100 outside. (that is not a problem with us at Savannah Park because we are a small community in any case.) and the restriction on buying alcohol totally has been modified to be Mon. to Thurs. 10am to 4pm. (Hospital staff were complaining of alcohol related cases clogging up their hospitals when they needed every bit of time and space for virus patients.)

So, I will be starting this Sunday, 21 Feb., with services at Savannah Park. We will combine ash wed. with first Sunday of lent. (most people here have to either walk or take public transport at night to come to an evening service, like Ash Wednesday, and they are being told to stay at home so as not to spread the virus, and they don’t have to be told at night because it is dangerous for those who have to walk as there are tsotsis (muggers and thieves)  along the way. One little girl, a student, was robbed of her cell phone and laptop and was stabbed in the process. She is a university student and needs these things for her studies. She is traumatized, and doesn’t know where to go to get help. Without her laptop she can’t do her studies. I have run out of funds to help people like her so it is just a tough situation.

I will also start with informal services at the hospital next week….Tues. 6am for the early birds and Friday 12 noon mostly for the admin. Staff. I told them I will also bring ashes for those who want.

The new liturgy that came from Rome for ashes says the priest prays a blessing  over the ashes, sprinkles with holy water, says the prayer over all present,…remember that you are dust and unto dust will return…..or…..repent and believe the good news (gospel). Then, so as not to touch anyone, instead of making a cross on their forehead with the ashes, he will sprinkle some on their heads. (ha, no consultation with the laity, especially women…. Some wear hair pieces, others, here in Africa, wear something like a turban called a duk. There is no way they can undo it to receive a sprinkling of ash. So, we shall see how we deal with this situation. Ha. I will let you know next time.

As for the pandemic, we have received some vaccines from India which have already started to be jabbed, and more from somewhere, Johnson and johnson, also being administered, starting with those on the front line. We, old timers, are waiting our turn, but I am not holding my breath. I know that we are streets ahead of other less developed countries and have some excellent doctors and scientists who will be trying to come up with a vaccine out of our own labs. Remember, the first heart transplant op was here in South Africa. It is further down the line in the health ministry where  there is chaos.

We had a president who, much like Trump, ran the country into the ground with some of his not well thought out new policies and appointments, and we are not trying to get back on some sort of normal track again, but it is difficult because he, like Trump, has his loyal followers, who refuse to accept the facts, coming from a special commission, that show clearly that he is guilty in many ways for the dire situation we are in now in South Africa.

Trump and Zuma are running on parallel lines here, both trying to discredit the normal institutions, like the constitutional court, for example, the constitutional court gave a decision that said that Zuma (the ex-president) must make himself available to the Zondo commission on the dates mentioned and is not allowed to keep silent, as this is necessary for the commission to get to the bottom of the allegations made against him or his administration when he was president.

He says, 1.   He doesn’t accept Zondo, the head of the commission, number two on the constitutional court (whom he himself appointed when he was president) because he is biased against him (without presenting proof---sound familiar?--) and he refuses to abide by the decision of the constitutional court, for the same reason, because it is biased against him—again with no proof….but going on to say that he respects the concourt but not the judges. Now what does that tell you. But, like Trump, among his followers, he is sowing seeds of doubt about most institutions in the country, the main one being the concourt.

 

So There is a lot of drams these days, as in the States. The newly elected president (both of them from the ANC, Cyril Ramaphosa) is walking on eggshells. He was elected by a hair (Zuma thought that the had made sure that he would not be elected ) and, like Pope Francis with the Curia, he has to be very careful about all that he says and does since Zuma’s supporters and just waiting for him to make a gaff, and they will toss him out and take over to continue to run the country like the mafia. I will have to answer for these words one day as they become public as soon as they go into my blog.

As far as my health goes, I am A OK, except for the continuing spasms in my left leg which I just have to live with. BP is fine, no sugar, brain still works, more or less, can still drive (what a blessing), take a shower, get dressed, put my socks on (that can be an interesting procedure) and put my sandals on (I don’t wear shoes any more. I had to buy a pair when I went to my Aunt Rose’s 100^th birthday in 2019 in Chicago in Feb.—snow and ice, not good for sandals). They don’t have buckles but Velcro, which makes it easy for on and off.

 

Well, let this be enough for now. Poor Cruz, going to Cancun , sunning on the beach, when his constituents are burning their furniture to keep warm. A real  stupid move for an opportunist like him.

Have a fruitful lent, some serious housecleaning. Love and Peace,   Fr. Cas

 Feb. 4, 2021

Let me share some thoughts with your about the “bipartisan” offer made by the republicans to the Biden team. If I remember correctly,  a team of Republicans came up with an offer of doing a bipartisan thing by having an economic recovery bill of $600 billion. It is less than half the amount that the Biden team had thought was necessary to help people and get the economy going again with $1.6 Trillion. Quite a big gap between what the Rebs were suggesting as a bipartisan effort to help struggling people and get the economy back on track.

     I think I smell something. As I see it there are three things to be considered here. 1. Time…urgency   2. Bipartisan..The Rebs reminded Biden that he promised to try to work together with them and this is his chance.. 3. What to do to help people…( wasn’t there a bipartisan bill that was put before Trump when he was still president. A bill for $900 billion, that both the dems and the rebs agreed on…. A miracle.  Then Trump refused to sign it saying that the $600 that was being offered to people wasn’t enough, it should be $1200.   Well, then the dems, now that they had Trump on their side, decided not to settle for less than what the rebs leader had suggested, and the whole thing never got off the ground, because the rebs would neve agree to the increase. Maybe I am wrong but I thought that the bill was never passed so people are still suffering.

Then, some cash into the hands of those who were unemployed, had lost their jobs, and health insurance, etc. and couldn’t pay for food, or rent or electricity (winter—heating). Then they would be able to use this money to buy the necessities and the economy would begin to function again. But that would mean lots and lots of money, more than the rebs were offering in their proposal to the dems.

Because of the necessity for doing something now now, there was no time for having long discussions to see where the rebs intended to cut back on the spending. People need help now, even yestermonth.

So if Biden refuses the offer, he is made to look bad because he claimed to want to build unity and bipartisanship, and look , he just turned down the offer.

He also had promised to help the people to get back on their feet, so if he doesn’t do something, he reneges on his promise there. Another disaster.

It is a lose lose situation for the dems.

Then the nuclear option comes up to look them in the face.

Ai think it was a deliberate trick to make Biden look bad. Maybe I am wrong, but that is how I see it. I am waiting to see what they are going to do now. Time is of the essence since people are really at the end of their tether

 

Feb. 2, 2021

The U.S. economy will return to its pre-pandemic size around the middle of this year, according to a new forecast from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office — even if Congress does not approve any more pandemic aid. But it will be years before everyone thrown out of work by the pandemic can return to employment.

The brightening outlook is a result of large sectors of the economy adapting better and more rapidly to the pandemic than expected, as well as increased growth from a $900 billion economic aid package that Congress passed in December.

 

The budget office expects the unemployment rate to fall to 5.3 percent at the end of the year, down from an 8.4 percent projection in July. The economy is expected to grow by 3.7 percent this year.

Stimulus response: President Biden met with Republican senators who are pushing for a much smaller alternative to his $1.9 trillion stimulus bill to address the toll of the pandemic. Administration officials warned that he wouldn’t accept their scaled-down proposal.   This seems very optimistic to me but I hope it is true. But aside from that, today, I was sleeping soundly, under two light blankets (it has been hot here lately so I have been sleeping without any covering except, perhaps, in the early morning, a sheet covering, but yesterday it got very cool and it was a great night for sleeping) and when the alarm went off, I really didn’t want to get out of bed, and changed to alarm to get another 15 minutes in  even though I had to cancel part of my usual pre-mass routine. Ha. It was soooo nice.   A few other things have been happening since my last posting on Jan. 13. One of the old timers, here, (92 yrs old) asked me to take him to the bank to do some work on merging his German accounts and his SA accounts. Believe it or not, I took my portable urinal along because I know that where the banking complex is in this shopping mall, it is faaaaar from the nearest toilet and I need a tree about every hour. Sure enough, it took him and hour and a half to get through his stuff. Can you, in the States or Europe, imagine taking an hour and a half at the bank? Anyway, the urinal saved me as I ducked out knowing that it was going to be a disaster if I didn’t. The joys of old age. Luckily, there was no one around when I had to do my thing, nature doesn’t wait. All’s well that ends well. We lost two priests (one a bishop) to the diocese of Durban (Bishop Gabuza and Msgr. Paul Nadal) two really great people. Gabuza was young, less than  65 and Nadal was a year older than me, and fit fit. But that didn’t stop the virus. We also lost a young seminarian, just about to be ordained a deacon, 31 yrs. old, to the virus. Thandoyenkosi Ngwenya, a Zimbabwean. Thandoyenkosi is a pagan name meaning, The will of the Lord. I am being sarcastic. In the old days the priest might not have allowed him to be baptized If he only had a pagan name (meaning a Zulu name) but must take a Christian name like Ferdinand (which would probably never be remembered by his family as he would still be called by his so-called pagan name, meaning, he was born because of the will of the Lord. How pagan can you get. The virus is going wild here. Our hospital, St. Mary’s , recently having lost its Catholic identity and become a government hospital, has turned its Marian wing (maybe about 45 beds, mostly 2 bed wards and one bigger 8 9r 10 bed ward) into a covid wing. The Marian wing, in the apartheid days was the white wing where everyone had insurance coverage, and those patients helped to pay for the rest of the hospital with its African patients who had no coverage, and little money to pay for medical help. But now it is all government and struggling (we are still trying to find donors to make up for what the govnt doesn’t pay).  The husband of one of my favorite nurses phoned me to ask me to come to give him wife, suffering from covid, the sacrament of the sick. It was 11 am. I said I would come at 2pm, but would first ask Maureen to organize things for me (Maureen is the head nurse at the hospital). When I phoned her and explained my plan, she said she refuses to let me go to the Marian wing because it is full of covid and the risk is too great, almost a certainty. I phoned her husband to explain and he said that he understood. (What was I ordained for, I was asking myself).  As it turned out, her husband also got the virus and both of them wound up on one of those 2 bed wards. He died of covid and she just barely pulled through. The only good thing about this is that she was able to be with him, pray with him, support him, encourage him, etc. right up to his last breath (so she said). That is a blessing that is denied of most dying covid patients. I visit the hospital at least twice a week just to pray for the staff and patients, trying to make myself visible as I go to the chapel to pray, hoping that my presence reminds them that we are in Gods hands and that I am on duty when I come to pray. The chapel is straight in from the main door so there is no danger of meeting corona, I hope. But I had better put this in the blog for now or I will forget again till the end of Feb. I have some other things on my mind as well. See you next time.

 

JAN. 13, 2021

I have been thinking that what has been happening there at the capitol bldg.. is the result of the lies that have been propagated and broadcast over and over and over by certain media. This convinced many of trump’s followers that they were in the right to do what they did, they were the true patriots in their own minds, because this has been pumped into them for 4 years now (false news, can’t trust the intelligence, don’t believe the science, the mainstream media are the enemy, the democrats are evil). No wonder the mob was like a bomb that just needed a fuse to be lit. Black Lives Matter broadcasting their message is , I think, the right use of free speech…human rights in the face of unjust or unfair use of police violence (you don’t hear of any cops shooting whites in the back), but the lies that were being propagated by trump --- stolen election, fraud, and all the other things he claimed, always without any proof (by the way all his claims were followed up and disproved by fact checkers), and now his facebook and twitter and netflix and other accounts have been closed (after seeing what happened as a result of his stirring up things through there media. But it is too late to close the barn door when the wild horse is on the loose again.

   Those kinds of media that propagate lies and hate and violence (even if it is hidden underneath) should be forced to prove what they are lying about or be taken off the media. This is more or less my gut reaction. I don’t think that lies or hate speech or inciting to violence can be covered by free speech.

I am really scared thinking of what could happen on or even before the 20^th. I hope it isn’t a blood bath or an assassination. I would advise Biden and Kamala Harris to wear flak jackets and maybe even have helmets handy. You saw what these crazies can do, even thinking that they are patriots and that Biden and Harris and the Democratic party are the evil enemy. You can listen to the people who are being interviewed by the journalists in trump territory. Scary.ca

A cousin in Maryland suggested that the most reason to impeach Trump may be what he didn’t do…the Confiteor, I confess ….what I did and what I failed to do.    He was watching the trashing of the capitol bldg.. offices on TV and probably gloating over it, and never lifted a finger to tell them to stop. I think he has a very valid and heavy point there. He could have easily done that but never did a thing. Only saying that he loved them and appreciated them, in so many words, encouraging them, as though they were on the right track by trashing the capitol bldg. offices and almost getting to the congresspersons and senators to harm them. Wow. Who cold ever have imagined that.

Jan. 15, 2021

Also, the Catholic Bishops’ Conference lambasted the tump supporters for their act of insurrection and several of the bishops, individually, said that we must pray for peace and healing in our country.

I must say, I am tired of hearing about praying for peace and healing. I have always thought that we pray for the wisdom and courage to DO what has to be done. See, Judge, Act…doing , action, not just praying. I am reminded of one of Ellen Degeneres programs when she had one of my heroines on her program, Sr. Joan Chittister, a prophetic voice for us Catholics and for anyone who is interested in trying to make this a better world, no matter how small your offering may be. When Ellen asked her what we should do, Sr. Joan responded…SOMETHING. Ha. I like that, do something. Take a food parcel to someone who has lost their job and can’t buy food. Pay someone’s rent for a month. Just make a phone call to cheer someone up, or console them or remind them that you are praying for them.   ……..Something

 

Jan. 3, 2021

 

JAMES PAULSEN 351128******4 From NHLS: Your COVID-19 Rapid Antigen test result is negative. Ref Number: CG05313998. For more info contact your doctor or Hotline 0801 212 88

     ( All of us here at  MD (Mater Dolorosa….old age home….emakehleni) received am SMS like this.SA is very sophisticated in this way. ) I would say that we can compete with just about any country in the world when it comes to the medical field. The only trouble is that the system is swamped by so many people that only a small minority can benefit by the expertise. If you have the money you can get expert attention. If not, bad luck. In such a lop-sided society, it is hard to find the right solution to help everyone. The tax base of those who earn (or just get) enough is still too small to support a system where probably ¾ of the population earn only a pittance. We need more than the wisdom of Solomon. We need the deep deep love of the Lord and a commitment to be of service to our brothers and sisters who are less   than we are, even though we may feel that it is asking too much of us. The Lord wasn’t stingy with His love for us, after all. We have to start seeing things more from God’s point of view than from our human point of view I thinkl

But there is another huge problem, CORRUPTION. The money that gets drained off by corrupt individuals or institutions is enormous. It could go a long way towards lifting the poor out of dire poverty to at least a level or two above dire poverty.

I was asked to give the homily today on the feast of the Epiphany, the Three Kings. Of course, from the Christian point of view, the basic meaning of this feast, the wise men from the East, is that they symbolize all the other nations besides the Jews, meaning that Jesus came and died for us all, not just the Jews. But this year, I chose to focus on the epiphany (revelation) that corona brought to us. Things that were, perhaps, there all the time but we just didn’t take notice of them very well before. It was like the star that the Three Kings saw showing them the way to the Saviour.  The star had its good side, like that, but also its bad side, like the fact that it drew attention to Herod that there was someone who was getting ready to take over his kingshup (Like Trump having to face the fact that Biden was taking over now, which is so painful to him that he has to do whatever is possible to make sure that that doesn’t happen.  Herod chooses to murder all the children of what he thought to be Jesus’ age to prevent his taking over. If it hadn’t been for the star those children, they would have escaped death).

1.       COUNT YOUR BLESSINGS.    Corona caused lots of hardships. People lost their livelihoods, jobs, homes, apartments, incomes, health insurance if they had any etc. and here we are, with a roof over our heads, three meals a day, people to look after us. It may not be 5 star, but we are alive and looked after. We should stop moaning and whining and be grateful for the blessings that have flooded our lives. And of course, the corollary, we should be willing to suffer a bit to help those who have not been so richly blessed. Maybe we are meant to be the blessing to them.

2.       TECHNOLOGY.   We have several vaccines now that are slowly becoming available to people, beginning with the most vulnerable, and, after some time, everyone. It normally took years to work on such a vaccine, research, testing, etc. and now it has been done in a year. Astounding. Amazing. This has also brought to our attention the other technological things that are slowly taking over our world, like ROBOTS. Many of the jobs that were promised by the politicians if you voted for them are no longer there. They have been taken over by robots. Robots, as we saw on the news the other day, who can also dance a complicated dance.

                     And it was amazing that so many countries were working at the same time on a vaccine, and doing it In    

                    record time, what would normally take ten years, with trials and all, was done in a year. Wow.

 

3.       The whole world working together to find a vaccine, With the WHO being a kind of distribution center as various reports were sent in about things people were doing and the results of their testing to be shared by the whole world. Pope Francis must have been thrilled. And when you watched the news at night you saw masks on people in Russia, China, US, Germany, Austria, UK, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Etc. etc. etc. world wide, which you never could have imagined before.

 

4.       CHURCH—New ways of being Church were being invented and discovered. ---Evangeliaing via the media like never before. Church life will never be the same.  Zoom, Facebook, Netflix, U-Tube, ---the church is learning more and more to use these tools .Receiving communion in your car …who could have imagined such a thing. And hearing confessions at the car window in the parking lot. And asking seniors not to come to church but to let the young members of the church to come when the churches were still open to people. (Something like Trump telling Republican Georgians not to vote because it was a fraud. Ha.)

 

5.       PREPARE TO DIE ALONE.  The new normal with the raging virus. No visitors (who could be spreaders), no one to comfort you or pray for/with you at your bedside. It looks as though this is going to be the way it is for a while.    And I am wondering how  a person can deal, in their spirit with multiple deaths,   5, o5 6, 0r 8 or 10 or even more. How does one absorb, in their spirit, so much pain and grief and loss, all at the same time?

 

(  A news item from this evenings news….the US added another 56 billionaires during the time of the pandemic. This is sick.)

 

Jan. 4, 2021

Trump pressured state official to ‘find’ votes

In an hourlong telephone call on Saturday, President Trump pressed Georgia’s top election official to “find” him enough votes to overturn the presidential election and vaguely threatened him with “a criminal offense,” according to an audio recording of the conversation.

 

He told the state’s Republican secretary of state that he should recalculate the vote count so Mr. Trump, not Joe Biden, would end up winning the state’s 16 electoral votes.

Can you believe this!!!!! What has happened to our country and to the respect we used to have with the president, even though we may have disagreed with him?????

 

Jan. 5, 2021

This morning, There were three things I wanted to do.

1.       Visit the hospital and wish the staff happy new year and pray for them and the patients in the chapel. I was told that a dear dear friend, an old time nurse, super dedicated, had succumbed to the virus and was in bad shape in one of the virus wards. I was very sad to hear that and was determined to find a way to go up and anoint her with the sacrament of the sick.

2.       Then, go and get some petrol, since the price of petrol is going up on Wed. by 40 cents a litre. (I forgot to take my wallet so I had to use the credit card.

3.       Then continue on the way to the catholic church in Pinetown to pick up the copy of the Baptism liturgy in Zulu from the priest there. He left if for me with the guard at the gate, Where I found it.

As soon as I got back home, I received a phone call from the husband of the nurse, who was at her side (I am sure that he is now positive) who asked me to come and do what I had more or less planned to do anyway. I told him I would be there at 2pm and would phone Maureen, the head nurse, for her to arrange for me to go to the ward.

I phoned Maureen and she said that she would not allow me to go to that ward because all the patients were infected with the virus and it was too risky. But she would go to check and get back to me. When she got back a few minutes later, she confirmed what she had said before that she would not allow me to go to that ward and that I must just pray for Thandokazi, who was on oxygen. I phoned the husband, who is also a good friend and explained to him what she said and he said that he understood but begged for more prayers, which I promised. Thandokazi, I am so sorry that I can’t come to you and be with you during this terrible and frightening time in your life. But, just know that I am praying that God will be merciful to you and bring you back to your health so that you can continue to bring your skills and your hope to the other virus patients. But, in the end we say, mayenziwe inthando yakho, may your will be done.     More and more phone calls keep  coming in announcing the  death of yet another person, or another one being taken to the hospital. The list keeps growing exponentially.

 

Jan. 1, 2021 Feast of Mafy, Mother of God (for us Catholics)

I found this on the internet this morning.

■ Untold numbers of vaccine doses will expire before they can be injected into American arms, while communities around the country are dealing with more bodies than their mortuaries can handle.

■ A pharmacist at a Wisconsin hospital has been arrested and accused of intentionally removing more than 500 doses of coronavirus vaccine from refrigeration last week, knowing that they would be rendered useless.

A good way to start the new year, I think, an old, even ancient, blessing.

I quote my wish for your now and during this whole new year of 2021m from the Book of Numbers, Ch. 6; 22-27, the first reading for today, Mary, Mother of God.   

 

   May the Lord bless you and keep you.      May he let his face shine on your and be gracious to you.....May the Lord uncover his face to you and bring you peace.

 

These are the words of a priest whose parish is near the Nashville blast.

 

“My message was that pandemics don’t last, economic setbacks don’t last, and terrorists don’t last and it’s God and the Kingdom of God that are going to last forever and other things are just temporary,” Neely said. “That God’s the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.”

 

Probably good to remember that. Nothing good lasts forever and nothing bad lasts forever. Put your money on what does last forever.

 

Nuclear war ---President Eisenhower said in a 1953 speech :  “Every gun that is made, every warship that is launched, every rocket fired, signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed…”

 

Jan. 2, 2021

Surprise, surprise. About 11am bishop Khumalo came to my room to say that we are all to go to Sanlam Center (a shopping mall) to be tested for covid 19. When. NOW. So I went next door to Bishop Lobinger (long retired, 91 yrs.old, soon, 92) and told him to meet me at my car at 11:20 saying that we were all going to be tested. Then I went to another neighbor, Fr. Urs, and told him and asked him to tell Fr. Dominic. We will all meet at the car at 11:20.

At 11;20 as we 4 got into my little car, the other 4 (Fr. Joseph, Fr. Bernard, the bishop himself, an Fr. Macarius, who had to be taken out of his wheel chair and the chair folded up and put in the boot (trunk)..

 

They have just renewed the shopping center and there is now a huge underground parking area where we gathered.

The novices and some of the other members of the monastery were there already (one of the novices was found to be positive so the whole monastery was in quarantine since last week. I guess, to be safe, our provincial , Fr. Bheki Shabalala, decided to have us all tested and got the health department to be ready for us.

Well we were all tested with that swab up and into the inner sanctum of our nose. The container was labelled and we were told to wait. Lo and behold, there was a health vehicle parked nearby that was actually a lab. So they did the lab work on the spot and in a short time the results for all of us came back NEGATIVE. Praise the Lord. By 1:30pm we were all back home. I wondered about getting, more out of curiosity than necessity, But it was a relief to know that we were all negative. We are all over 80 (some way over 80) and are very vulnerable. Now we can more or less relax but make sure that we continue to wear our masks and keep proper distance from others and keep our hands sanitized. Nice to know.

 

I have other things I want to put in today but let me start with this.

 

 Dec. 4, 2020

Now that it is clear that Biden is in for Jan. 20, I can start to grow my fingernails again.

Here are some personal things for a change. Most or many of you know that my birthday is the 28^th of November. That was in 1935, so I am now past 85 heading for 86 (When I was up in Johannesburg last year, I was staying with a couple whose wedding I had performed and as I returned from moving around town I came to the gate of their gated complex and forgot the magic entry number. The guard asked for my driver’s licence ---it had nothing to do with me getting into the complex, but I have learned that it is easier to just go along with it rather than to challenge it---so when he say my date of birth he said “Usaquba na?” Are you still driving? Ha. I found out it is much easier than walking.

Getting back to my birthday, a friend whom I met 53 yrs, ago in St. Mary’s hospital when I was chaplain (1967, 68,

69) 1967 When  she was giving birth to her lastborn son, offered to supply a lunch for me on my birthday (a custom evolved that when it is her birthday, I take her to lunch, and when it is my birthday, I take her to lunch) I of course accepted, but at her house rather than at a restaurant. However, I asked that it be on Friday the 27^th, because it is a tradition at our old folks home that on one’s birth or feast day, there is a cake and a glass of wine, I wanted to be home for lunch on Saturday the 28^th. No problem. She had ordered Prawn (shrimp) curry which is a favorite of mine. She also invited a nun friend of hers as well as her parish priest (pastor), a youngish Indian named Michael Ndaraju, one of the nicest priests I know in the Durban diocese. It  was a great time that we had lasting from before lunch to after 5pm when we really had to head back to our homes.

Then, of course, there was the celebration at lunch at Mater Dolorosa (MD) with all my old brothers. Only retired bishop Fritz Lobinger is older than I (He is 92 and still pushing nicely). I was told that I am now the oldest member of the Mariannhill community in the Mariannhill and Mthatha provinces. Hard to believe. I don’t feel that old. Ha.

Another friend and his wife also invited me to a lunch at their house, at 2:30 in the afternoon (that was after the lunch with the old timers). Well, we took it in stages, and the last stage , after the Briyanni, was some ice cream. Ha. I was stuffed. I really overate and had trouble sleeping that night as it was not settling well, but I survived.

Then, on Sunday the 29^th of Nov., I was at Savannah Park, as usual, for the 8am Mass and had been warned not to rush off after Mass, so I knew that there was something cooking.(But I didin’t know that there was much more after Mass somewhere else). So, after Mass there was some soft drink and cupcakes for the community and the traditional singing of happy birthday.

I usually go up to the house of the leader of the community (Mike Pillay, a Indian leading a mostly Zulu community…we are very integrated) where his wife, Annetta, usually prepares a lunch, but this time,  I was told, there is going to be a braai (a cookout). The Braai is a kind of traditional was of celebrating anything. It means, lots of meat (beef, pork, and sausage.) They said the Braai would be at 1pm (this was about 10am) and I knew that they meant 1pm African time, not world time. Ha. So, Annetta was kind enough to feed me a bit before the actual braai. Then the people whom they had invited began to arrive. Most of them were family members of Mike whose family is a mini united nations, with all colors under the sun. There were also some young seminarians and a deacon from Madagascar who had been at Mass with us earlier in the morning.

But the frosting on the cake was that the parish priest (I am only the hired hand) also came and brought a retired archbishop with him, Slattery, who is spending time here in our diocese trying to get things better organised. I knew him from years before when he was the bishop of a neighboring diocese where I used to pop in from time to time to have a chat and a cup of coffee. I was happy to see him. Then one of my Provincials came as well and  after some eating and drinking, the speeches started. I won’t have to wait for canonization because they did it there. Eventually they gave me a chance to get in a few words of thanks and appreciation too. Among other things, They gave me a beautiful birthday candle with the number 85 on it. It is too nice to burn but I have a secret way of preserving it.

I made it back in time for supper (6pm) but I skipped supper because I was stuffed again.

On Monday I had an appointment with a neurologist. I wanted to have him check out my back which is very crooked (again---scoliosis they call it) to see if (which I dreaded) I might have to have another back op. However, he just knocked on my back, going down the spine, vertebra by vertebra, asking is there was pain, which there wasn’t, so he said no need to think of an op, at least not now. Because my left leg never got straight at the knee, my left leg is a bit shorter than the right and, I guess, the muscles pull a little bit to the other side which pulls the spine a bit out of being straight. He didn’t seem to think that there was a big problem, and I breathed  a sigh of relief.

That was Monday, Dec. 1. On Tuesday I drove (thank the Lord I can drive an the spasms don’t bother me)

Bishop Lobingrer to the bank In the morning. In the afternoon I went to Sr. Amanda to fetch a baptism candle for a friend and his wife for the young daughter whose baptism we are preparing.

On Wednesday evening I took the candle over to their house and brought a nice baptismal certificate to be kept as a kind of keepsake of that important day.

Thursday, The house doctor came to check us out (he does this on his own time) and I gave him the information about my back. I then went to the  pharmacy to get my monthly supply of pills (I have become a pilleater, drug addict). They gave me something to calm down the spasms (they use it for epilepsy) and it is working like a charm. I still have the spasms but they are able to be dealt with now.

I am going to stop now as I am going to the hospital for a noon service. I am going to play a song for them on my computer and use that as a way to stimulate some thinking about what we want to pray about. See you later. 

 

 

 

 

Dec. 2, 2020

The U.S. prepares for the Biden administration

In a further affirmation of President-elect Joe Biden’s victory and a major repudiation of President Trump’s baseless claims that he was defrauded in last month’s election, Attorney General William Barr said the Justice Department had not uncovered significant voting fraud, while Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican majority leader, referred for the first time to a “new administration,” seemingly a tacit acknowledgment of Mr. Biden’s win.

 

As the U.S. prepares for the transition to the Biden administration, its economy hangs in limbo. Mr. Biden has called for Congress to come together to pass a “robust” relief package to help households and businesses.

The Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell, backed Mr. Biden’s reach-across-the-aisle approach, warning Congress that “the outlook for the economy is extraordinarily uncertain” without an effort to smooth the transition.