Retired

St. Francis in our
courtyard

The feast of St. Francis was well participated in our main church. Very crowded. The traditional Transitus ceremony was solemn as it recalled the last day of Francis' life. 

The rest of the week was filled with closing my work at the university library. On Oct 5 I officially retired from work there. It's been over 15 years when I was asked to reorganize the library (rebuilt physically as well) and unite it with the historical library from the main monastery 1km away. now the catalogues are united with a total of110,000 titles and some 2000 periodical titles. It's been a massive job. But it's done. We've saved lots of space and money as a result. Now I can withdraw and retire. Now I only have one smaller library to care for ... less pressure on my health. With my heart and kidney problems, I won't be able to handle so much work from now on. Time to slow down.

This week saw lots of violence all around the country - arabs fighting jews, jews fighting arabs, jews fighting jews, arabs fighting arabs .... unbelievable. Borders will be closed this evening because the jewish feast of tabernacles ends and another feast immediately begins Simhat Torah. More spitting attacks at our church with hundreds of orthodox jews pass our gate to harass us. Police are now stationed at our gate. Yesterday 3 were arrested and the day before 5 were arrested. Videos of their spitting at a Vietnamese group making the Way of the Cross has gone viral and International. Govt ministers immediately distanced themselves from these perpetrators though we know they need them for the coalition. Even the chief rabbis condemned it. I don't know how hopeful things will change. But I won't be surprised if these extremists will take revenge in some other ways, like hacking our websites etc.