Reflections
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The day before Chirstmas! Time for an early morning bike loop around our town of Kitwe, Zambia! Half an hour out, we stopped for some of Mabel’s ground-nuts and delicious freshly fried kasava. One kwacha, or about five cents, gets you a slice of kasava, or a small bag of groundnuts — and a “God
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Sometimes it seems we are “coasting” toward sharing the faith. “If the opportunity presents itself,” we say, “I will always be ready to give a reason for the hope…” Whatever happened to intentionality? That’s where our new campus vehicle, the Coaster Bus, comes in! (Coasters are 24-seaters in Zambia, made by Toyota). This is a Bus on a
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Ah, tis the close of a most auspicious day, November 20, 2020. Let us pause to note the perfect symmetry of the day — 20.11.20 — which we shall not see again for a hundred years! Such balance! In this world of ours, which is most pathologically askew? 20.11.20! This day is like a gift.
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They opened the Cobourg Beach today after a summer-long shutdown. With the Corona virus simmering all around the province, one day up, the next day down, the town fathers had decided this was a reasonable precaution — keeping the beach-lovers off the beach for the entire summer. But today, the second Monday of September, was
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Goodness, as the streets of America burst into flame during this summer’s unrest, you wondered if democratic structures themselves were being consumed. Minneapolis-St.Paul was visited by someone called “the umbrella man,” who liked to get in the middle of a riot and start fires. A video of “umbrella man” went viral after protesters in Minneapolis
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Kind of like the erosion of a shoreline, the Coronavirus keeps wearing people down. You could call it the erosion of hope. Like for the people caught between Colombia and Venezuela — thousands who had evacuated the shambles of their homeland for the chance at a better life next door. Colombia! The land of promise
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I heard recently that King Lear was written while Shakespeare was in quarantine. So deadly was the plague sweeping across England in late July 1606, that Shakespeare’s company, the King’s Men, had to lock the playhouse doors. Just two years earlier, more than 30,000 Londoners had died in an outbreak. Plague’s symptoms included fever,
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When I heard that Milan was opening up 35 post-Covid kilometres of new bike routes, I thought it might be time to upgrade. We’ve got a collection of four bikes, one from the pawn shop, at least one from behind Dominic’s garage. I doubt that any would be welcome on the Strade Aperte— the
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A spell of Coronavirus can give you a fresh appreciation for the church. We now know what the psalmist meant when he said, “My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord!” (Ps 84). In church-loving Zambia, “No church!” was a most unwelcome antiviral prescription. And as the churches have gradually re-opened,
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You don’t expect Cruise Ships to be stranded at sea. Nor do you expect their holiday passengers to be calling for help. Who would ever have thought that those floating hotels would become the last place on the planet you wanted to be! Yet as the Coronavirus took hold and cases began to show up
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Obviously, the police need protection. The criminal element out there is not getting any nicer — no matter where you live. Fighting crime is an honourable and most dangerous profession, one which enormously benefits us all. It takes great courage and calls strong public support. Including as many safeguards as possible. Yet there is another
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A “V-shaped” recovery from this pandemic of ours is pretty hard to envision. Such has been the economic unraveling, the devastated infrastructure, the human toll of the “fastest economic contraction in three hundred years” — some say it will take years to recover. At best, they say, the recovery will be “U-shaped.” Then there are
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During three days of Covid-quarantine in Addis Ababa, our only relief from the hotel room was the balcony. Fortunately, we were looking down at a very interesting hive of industry, an excavated construction site, where some seventy-five workers were busy as bees, putting together underground parking and the entrance level for a new hotel.
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It sounded too good to be true, this Easter Season piece by Peggy Noonan of the Wall Street Journal. Ms. Noonan says that positive social attitudes actually build up during times of imposed isolation. And when it’s over, she says, you are ready to embrace the world! She quotes Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist,
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You can certainly pick up the 2020 Corona Virus in church. It’s unfortunate, but passing through the hallowed doors does not grant immunity. In fact, for some, attending church may not be a good idea until this thing subsides — even with social distancing, masks galore and sanitisers! However, there are other things you
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It was my Easter sunrise bike loop, somewhere around 6.30. Country road, beautiful morning mist. Out of the pre-dawn haze an old diesel came rattling down the road with one yellow headlight — and the sounds of a major ruckus on board! A Panorama Security truck came into view, their truck hauling a bunch of yapping
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We like to host the Fouth Years for Tea before Easter. What a great group of prospective graduates. • Joseph Makanzu already has a church-plant and orphanage ministry underway in Ndola.Gift Kaputula us such a talented worship leader, he is in demand for week-end ministry most week-ends. • Sunday Siwale is a prospective Military Chaplain.. • Council President
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Personally, I like a landline. When you’re home, you’re home; when you’re out, you’re out. That’s exactly what Alexander Graham Bell had in mind when he said, “When one door closes, another opens.”
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Fresh from the nest, a speckled, newborn robin lifts a head toward the sun, One tiny chick awash in an endless bed of green replete with creeping morsels at his feet, A lavish spread for the burrowing beak, while tiny bugs and flitting flies dance for their new guest; Discovering paradise, just outside the nest.
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We had a big surprise arriving home from college last week. Mop and pail in the middle of the hall, cleaning supplies strewn all around – it looked like Victoria had left in a hurry! She comes by in the mornings to keep the dust down. We tried a few numbers. No answer. So we
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We were washing down the truck after a long day on the Kawama roads. Fine, misty rain. Instant rinse. “You sure that’s worth the effort?,” asked a visiting friend. He was joining our faculty for ten days at the college and knew about our rainy-season mud holes. “I’d say you guys are fighting a losing
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You know it’s going to be a good year when the milk comes out in lumps. 2016! A year to move from fluid to solids! To deal in substance! (not to abuse it, of course). A year to stop floating on the shifting tide like a quivering bead of butter fat. Nay, tis a year
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It was tough going out there Saturday morning, on the fringes of Racecourse. We were in the Shanty Town neighbourhood which sprawls around our campus with some 400,000 souls. It was the long-awaited day to lay out the footprint and pour the footings for our new Barnabas Youth Centre — a gift from Canadian donors
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2015…. Some churches got badly off-balanced. Let’s hope they straighten up this year! ! In some regions, the extremes revolve around fetishes. Holy water, anointing oil, even sacred brooms: for a fee, also known as a “faith offering” or “planting a seed,” you can go home with your fetish and “watch miracles happen!” Another extreme
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For those who like to have their Håagen Daz and eat it too, there is good news from Ivy League professor Mark Blyth: “Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea.” Blyth’s recent book says you do not help a country like Greece by imposing tax hikes, spending cuts and the like. You help Greece by
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There was joy in the air as I walked the neighbourhood this morning. A woman singing as she walked along Jambo. A gardener raising a tune as he worked the fringes of Chandawali. Big smiles from the man pushing his wheel-barrow down Kenyanta, dodging the potholes. “Are you opening your grocery today? But it’s a
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We drive a Buick. It doesn’t really feel like it, but it’s getting to be an “old” Buick. Getting close to 300,000 kms on the clock. It’s a 1996, inherited from Ruth’s late parents, Myrrl and Ethel. I keep a supply of answers ready for the ever-new crowd, always upgrading everything from iPhones to
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“Our world is formed only for ostentation; men inflate themselves with wind and go bounding around like balls. “We are great fools. ‘He has spent his life in idleness,’ we say. ‘I have done nothing today.’ What have you not lived? That is the most illustrious of your occupations. “‘If I had been placed
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“Even while you lie among the sheepfolds, the wings of my dove are sheathed with silver, its feathers with shining gold” (Ps 68:13). I always like this promise of divine favour. You may not be on the scene. You may not be dressed for battle. Quite the opposite. You might be in “recline.” But God
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Happened to watch some Final-Round Curling and some Play-Off Hockey on the same night. Yikes. The one puts you into a lethargic Lotos-land of pleasure. Pass me another donut. The other is so fast-paced it leaves you gasping for breath! And on this particular night, as they carried the wobbling wounded off the ice, it
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I was stopped by the police on the way to church one Easter Sunday! “Doing a hundred-and-six,” said the officer, “in an eighty.” That’s kilometres. Officer Gallagher picked it up on his reverse radar. “But where was the sign?,” I asked, instinctively. I’m from Zambia, where the signs are largely invisible. This officer ignored such
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But that Christ on His cross did rise and fall, Sin had eternally benighted all. Yet dare I almost be glad, I do not see That spectacle of too much weight for me. Who sees Gods face, that shines with life, must die ; What a death were it then to see God die? It
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Another year of Facebook! Think about it… the “social network!” Such a cool invention, a place to be sensitive and insightful, to bless all your friends with your fresh inspiration and ideals! Or, on a given Monday, you can even be out of sorts and garrulous, grumbling and contentious about this and that… blights and
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It’s very fascinating to watch a herd of elephants come out of the bush to a pool for a drink at the end of day. You’d think that it would take a lot of gurgling and slurping to fill those huge bodies with fluid. Adult males weighing in at two tons apiece, needing 300 gallons
JCK-at-large SITE 