3rd Lockdown

Christmas gifts
from MC sisters

 The lockdown has begun. I'll try my best to stay indoors unless there are important business like payments to be done. I'll still have to go out once in a while to buy bread and medicine. We're allowed to do that. We can walk not beyond 1km from our homes. I've planned to do alot of reading during lockdown. And spend quality time with JJ and Buddy who've been missing me the few days when I've been busy at the office clearing up work before the lockdown starts. I'll need to stock up food for them .... but I cant buy anything today as it's the Sabbath.

M. Teresa's sisters gave me alot of Christmas presents.: a scarf, a beanie, 3 pairs of socks and a lovely comfortable pair of loafers. I guess they've noticed my socks full of holes and shoes glued together by superglue whenever I go to their convent for weekly confessions and adoration. 

Our sisters

In the Christian Quarter, there's a little more cheer than usual. The Christmas trees at the La Salle College is the landmark of Christmas every year ... with a smaller tree at the Catholic Scouts center and another at Terra Sancta College. The scouts and school have organised Christmas parties and given out presents to the kids ... it's a nice cheer to an otherwise quiet Christmas because parents have lost their jobs and cannot afford new clothes or presents. I've been trying my best to distribute clothes and food to the MC sisters to distribute to the poor but the restrictions and now lockdown have made it impossible.

In the southern Gaza borde,r tensions have risen. Gaza fired 2 rockets into Israel on Christmas Day and Israel fired back. No peace. Our Christians must be frightened by these bombings ... besides the dreadful Hamas muslim directive from the Ministry of Religious Affairs calling muslims not to join christians at Christmas celebrations ... implying Christians shouldn't celebrate the feast publicly. There was huge backlash fro other muslim organisations and the Fatah govt in Ramallah, calling it discriminatory and divisive. Christians have always enjoyed the right of religious freedom and the Hamas Minister was sowing division and intolerance. Just wait till the European govts stop funding the Hamas govt because of religious discrimination and persecution .... then they'll learn their lesson.