Weekend over

Hitching a ride

So the weekend passed with quite a lot of violence again. After the lull, there have been an average of 4 stabbings or hit-and-runs throughout the country. Jerusalem has had several instances, though not in the Old City. They occur quite far away from the tourist areas. This morning there was the stabbing by 2 arab girls: 14 and 16 yrs old. A security video of the stabbings has gone viral on the Internet. One can see that the girls were waving
scissors and not frantically stabbing anyone before they were shot by security guards. The word in the street is they wanted to be shot, they wanted to die ... why? Street wisdom says they might have been forced into marriages they didn't want and they chose to die instead.  Be that as it may ... it's troubling that youths at that young age have been the main perpetrators of these few months' attacks. It's not normal.

Th weather has been very cold lately. Everyone is out with winter jackets and hoodies. If this keeps up, Christmas will be very cold. I have to keep warm though with my pneumonia and infected sinuses. The medicine makes me tired easily but after 4 days of no work, today I had to get back to the office otherwise the backlog will be too much to catch up.

The PDDM sisters in Jerusalem

Sunday was Christ the King feast but it was also St. Cecilia's feast day. I had the usual Armenian Mass at 9am but since the superior of the PDDM sisters community in charge of the Armenian Catholic Basilica is Cecilia, they had a feast day lunch and invited me over. They were very nice to specially cook food that I could eat, asking beforehand what I was allergic to. PDDM stands for Pious Disciples of the Divine Master ... one of the congregations founded by St. Alberione and forms part of the Pauline family. This Thursday is their feast of Alberione their founder and they have asked me to preside at Mass. And they'll prepare dinner as well!