Charity

As we reach the last week of Ramadan, each day the events at the mosque become more elaborate, longer and louder. It will climax on Friday. The streets will be crowded.

Meanwhile someone must have hacked into my blog and fiddled with it because I'm having lots of problems posting my updates. Sometimes the blog even changes sites. You guys ought to help me trace who is doing this.

Fr Niccacci, moderator of my thesis, came to see me yesterday morning. He returned from Italy only the evening before. He wanted to know how much I had covered, and we discussed how to further the research. He wnats me to hand in a paper of 25 pages this week. Tough. Can't do it. Need to bargain with him. Anyway he said that I'm not getting any holidays and any other assignments until I finish my work. Going to be a tough year.

I'll probably go visit the hospital in Nazareth tomorrow. My ankle and right hand is still aching very much and the doc in Jerusalem wants an xray done. He also wants my white blood count checked.

Just a short reflection on today's first reading from Proverbs "Do not refuse a kindness to anyone who begs it, if it is in your power to perform it." Try putting this in practice today - remember God's ways are not our ways, His thoughts not our thoughts; so do not calculate how much kindness/charity to show and to whom. If everyone believed in this, there would be no tragedy like the Marriott bombing in Pakistan, nor the cruel persecution of Catholics in Orissa (India) and Iraq. I was horrified to learn that a Catholic mother in Iraq was served a huge dish by some extremists in her house - only to open it and found her baby cooked in rice. It was reported on TV. Pray, and show charity ... it's the only weapon against evil and violence. Revenge will only beget revenge.