New moon, new missal

Full moon

 First Sunday of Advent. And it started with a big change in the italian Missal. It's small changes, unlike the english revision ... but the eucharistic prayers  were quite extensive. Like the english revision, the italian version is a direct translation from the latin. As a result it sounds very stilted and not at all sonorous. It will take some time to get used to it. Officially it takes effect on the first week of Easter, but the Custody decided to start on the 1st Sunday of Advent so everyone gets used to it I'll stick to english.

The full moon is out. Very bright on a cloudless cold night. Well it was very cold during the day too ... between 6 to 12 degrees. I stayed home all day ... cleaning my room slowly as the pain in my right foot is excruciating. At 4pm I decided to go to the money changer as I am all out of shekels. The shekel is very low ... only 3.3 shekels to a US dollar. I bought some food for some of our students who are working so hard to finish their thesis and return home, they don't even eat daily meals. I do what I can to make life less stressful for them ... and that they don't get sick.

Chrysanthemums galore

The cold weather has been good for chrysanthemums. Those in the garden of the MC convent are so profuse they toppled over with heavy and profuse blooms. The sisters cut them and put them in their chapel but there were still many left so they gave them to me. I put them on our little Madonna statue in our refectory. They look fabulous.

Tensions are rising at our eastern border as Iran vowed to bomb Israel if it\s confirmed that Israel assassinated one of its top nuclear scientist. Eilat and Haifa have been mentioned as possible targets. Frightening. I guess the country will be put on red alert for the next days.