Your Word, O Lord, is loveliness.
Thus it is fitting that your Gospels
are clad in shining gold and silver
Made to gleam and impress and remind us
that your living wisdom is a treasure beyond all else.
Yet - fair and proper as it is -
I think of the humble, well-worn
simple and plain Bible of a saint
Tattered cover and crinkled pages
Borne through sweltering jungles
Stained by rain and sea and sun
And my heart burns at its beauty.
And even lovelier still is that
which I cannot see -
Your holy Word known so well by your saint
Imprinted upon their very heart.
2025-10-26
written ~1:50 PM
She came from remote Albania to Calcutta all the way
as a young Catholic nun to permanently stay.
By chosen profession a passionate teacher unflawed,
destiny drove her to be a benign missionary of God.
Overcame ups and downs in pious path for herself she set,
besieged by the agony of the sick and the destitute she met,
the self-less soul heard the compassionate decree of divinity,
and home she brought them to the Missionaries of Charity.
Decades ago she made alone her singular humane journey,
absorbed in fountain of joy the tears of the indigent and needy.
For human service her kind heart did whatever it could surmise,
she received the Magsaysay and also the Nobel Peace Prize.
The benevolent soul got beatified and she was canonized,
caring universal mother entered the sanctum of sainthood sanctified,
for, to the world of the deprived she belonged divinely enticed,
and found a blessed place in the heart of Jesus Christ.
1
Since 1983, I spent each year
With her, or reasonably near
O to think I once was young, in love
With U (USA) running from African woe
That apartheid in South Africa
Yet I hadn't planned to leave her
I'd visit a month or two, less than a year
Even when I worked (one in Mandela's time,
A deputy director in their State Dept.)
But now, I've missed America much
Four years soon, another home
Albeit for a cause (Great Commission)
How i wish I'd not obeyed "religion"
2
Without you, Sundays are free
I have no religious duty or Assembly
I have little to look forward to
But loving U was stressing me also
I made an healthy choice, the break
Now to live -- hour by hour, by the minute
Here and now, though memories rising like Jesus
Reveal addiction to nationalism.
Romulus? Remus?
Maybe
It’s best
Or maybe it’s better to believe
God wishes
To spread His spirit
Like dandelion seed to wind
Where it lands
It should stay
Resist the story of Ham
Embrace Eve
Mission not
In masts of ships or cannons shots
Nor with whips, coins, crowns, holy books, fighter jets
Or in a noose of love
Allow
The flower
To settle with its own face
To root and sow in a fertile place
Bloom in heart
Take shape with all its local smells and colors
A bouquet just for you.
He approaches the globe like an open dome,
leaving the comforts and confines of home,
seeking to find each tribe, wherever they roam,
to make the power of Christ's sacrifice known.
9-5-2022
1.
I need courage
To live CHRIST-ian
I tasted intimacy
In Triune Communion
2.
At my age
With second family
I cannot complain
Except for spirituality
I wanted visions
Of Jesus, Trinity
3.
Can't see Face
God's. And live?
I settled then
For African evangelism
Still want intimacy
Tasted back then
As I write ... streams slow
And a trickle of guilt
Flow, flow, flow
"Father, father, Faaathhher"
From beyond my gate and border
"Pastor, pastor, pastor"
Was the cry an hour before
He, Shady, got 5 Rands; he hoped for more
But as I write, I decide
Wonga won't be attended to
8 o'Clock at night? No, Charity will wait
I have shared uncooked & cooked rice
And the usual soups, bread, fruit
Coins adding up to 30 Rands
But mostly under 17; to enhance
My safety - giving minus predictability
So my "parishioners" see limits
But raised mostly Catholic, FATHER
Comes naturally to them -
I did not take any title at the beginning
They avoid churches, even at funerals
Tents at homes is the local culture
So I share a little, though few attend
Our Protestant style of worship
Yet, once a week I invent JesusLuvsU Day
Jesus is Love, Love, LOVE
I
Many who heard of Nelson Mandela visited the country in which he (and I) were born. Today I posted about walking or wading through diapers, dog & human doodoo on our roads, many dirt roads, in Newtown, 5720, near Ft. Beaufort. Don't be whitewashed by Google maps & KFC signs.
II
Power was cut by provider Eskom at 11 am today. It's now 8 pm on Feb 2,:2022. Power has not been restored. The SABC Radio news said we can expect this "loadshedding" through the weekend, till Monday. Welcome to the new, new South Africa. But a great place to spread the light of Jesus & His Word. Shalom shalom & Anen
aka "The Missionary Position" per Jan
Missionaries knocked on our door
And saw the wife flat on the floor
They said it was rude
To lie in the nude
But not in the clothes that they wore?
Tell me how may I show you devotion?
No words are left in this dictionary.
Which fool said love is just an emotion?
My Goddess, I am your missionary.
The essence of time is not eternal,
but my adoration is evergreen.
You are a flower that is nocturnal.
Alive in every season - nature's queen.
When adversity knocks upon your door,
let me soothe your misery and sorrow.
Does not matter if we are rich or poor,
I will provide a better tomorrow.
Come lose yourself in desire and passion.
Our romance will invent a new fashion.
Silent One
Originally written on 30 October 2015.
Re posted 17 November 2020
At Chefoo Reconsidered we did speak
Of faith as something we as children held
To be most precious, with our parents’ fierce
Example holding us to sacred truths
But now as adults with accomplished years
We looked with cool detachment on that fire
And wondered if with tainted motives they
Flew us from homelands to a foreign field
With them to fight for faith against some foe
That now may seem to us imaginary
And in so doing wound our youngling souls
Yet all the same - some fire of faith persists
Be it nostalgia for our Mums and Dads
Or maybe glowing remnant of belief
(Or did the love of Jesus never die?)
Thus in your writings, Andrew, and your poems
A light of kindled faith I feel, and warm
To its blessed incandescent rays as one
Who faith did sometime lose, yet seek again
W-ell
E-xecuted
L-ocal
C-ampaign
O-n
M-issionary
E-ndeavor
K-eeps
A-ttendees
P-ersistent
A-s
T-enacious
I-nviters
D-raw
K-een
O-bservers
Form: Vertical Monocrostic
Jesus moved into the town of Samaria
for he left Judea to head for Galilee
but his route took him to this town
for this was where God wanted him to be
Having heard all that Jesus told her
she left the water jar for a new direction
telling others of this Jesus she had met
she knew the compulsive power of a new affection
This Samaritan woman had a holy boldness
as the disciples did when they left their nets
when Jesus called them to follow him
as God's will was to go in His steps
This woman's testimony was to tell of Jesus
who told her all that she ever did
she may not have even known His name
but Jesus knew her and why he came
Having met Jesus she wanted more
more of Jesus and more she got
for this woman pleaded with Jesus
a missionary was her call as she sought
(John 4: 1-54)
It's not always that missions are about "the goings" to somewhere else We have felt the tug of God's Spirit and thought he was sending us to
evangelize the world from sea to sea. But we later discovered that God was more pleased when He saw us teaching our families by examples in our homes.
We thought that God was sending us to Africa, and we were willing to go, but God wanted us to be missionaries to our next-door neighbors. We had great
compassion for the Asian continent, but God placed us in the heart of China Town USA to love from door to door. We sensed a solemn call to minister and teach in India, but we never bothered to meet an East Indian in our hometown.
We were well trained and ready to be missionaries in South America,
but we became frustrated when God redirected us to Spanish Harlem. Sometimes mission work is all about "the doings" right where we are.
10292007cjPoSoup
Conversion
Leopard, jugular eyed, silent,
did you pause to rest too long?
See how she pulls you about her throat
how lightly you rest upon her shoulders.
Upon what missionary did you feed
that you should be so converted?
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