Annunciation Feast Retreat

Fr. Dharma preaching the retreat

I decided to go on my Lenten retreat today, Solemnity of the Annunciation,  as I had missed our community retreat 2 weeks ago due to work. It was a last minute thing but it was a good choice. it took place at our parish of St. Anthony in Jaffa. Fr. Dharma our assistant chaplain to the Indian community preached the retreat. It was simple but good. Something a franciscan friar should do .... not like those super intelligent professors who do mental gymnastics and use fanciful words which no one but themselves understand.

There were about 30 participants mainly filipinos and africans. The high gothic style church  is magnificent, And the man stained glass windows made the church look very elegant. Across the street the Greek Catholic Church hosted the Indian community retreat ... there were thousands. One capuchin preached while 3 others were listening to confessions. The queues stretched all round the church garden. It was fantastic. After that the capuchins had to go to Haifa (120 km) for the afternoon retreat; and tomorrow they go to Tiberias (90 km) and Kiryat Shemona (120 km) near the Lebanese border. They have a lot of work to do.

Stained glass
window of St.
Antony of Padua

Back at St. Anthony's, there was also recitation of the Franciscan Crown - the 7 decade rosary of the 7 joys of Mary -  and the Way of the Cross. After that I went to St. Peter's Church down the road to spend some quiet time. It was on this day over 25 years ago that I was ordained ... and I celebrated Mass alone in the Crusader chapel ... lots of quiet time to reflect.

After that i went out to be with my jewish friends selling their wares at the church plaza. I helped Bar sell nuts and it was a great success today. Next stall was Rudy my great buddy and next to him was Meir's stall ... his son Ben always calls me "ahi" in hebrew meaning "my brother". That's usually a term used by jews for fellow jews. Well actually Rudy also calls me that ... as also the security guys in front of my house in Jerusalem. They consider me one of them. No wonder some of the arabs hate me. There's one arab man near the Austrian hospice who always calls me "jewish dog" whenever I pass by. I know one day one of the arabs will stab me because of my friendship with jews. But I have no regrets nor am I intimidated. I am a friend of everyone.

At St. Peter's there was one of our students taking a 4 day break from school. Being the Sabbath, there was no cook in the monastery so we both went down to the Town center to buy some food ... it was already 3.30pm. We had a nice chat ... not as student and professor but as confreres. It was nice to be away from the academic atmosphere in Jerusalem.