STATELESSNESS
Stateless people from all over the world live in situations of limbo, lacking a nationality, which prevents them access to the basic rights of any citizen of a country. The causes of statelessness are varied, including bureaucratic obstacles, but they all result in the deprivation of the dignity deserved by any human being. This underlines the importance of lobbying to end statelessness in the world.
MISSION IS FUN
Two funerals in Kildare
BY FR MUSEKETERI MKOTOKOTO
FR JORGE (not his real name) was fairly new in the parish of Waterval. He was asked to hold a funeral and burial service in the home of one of the parishioners who had just passed away in the community of Kildare.
Early on Saturday morning, Fr Jorge hurriedly left the mission in his vehicle, a Toyota Venture, speeding towards this village situated in the district of Bushbuckridge, in the province of Mpumalanga.
When Fr Jorge approached the house of the deceased, he saw a crowd walking towards the venue, but among them he could not recognize a single parishioner. Finally reaching the deceased’s home, he entered the tent located in the house’s courtyard, but still, he could not identify a single familiar face. He began to worry about how to start the mass without any catholic faithful present.
In the meantime, in another home in the same village of Kildare, a fairly large number of Catholics, amongst other mourners, were anxiously singing and waiting for Fr Jorge. There, the ‘correct’ deceased was waiting to be properly and ecclesiastically sent off by his priest!
FLEEING FROM FRIENDS
Fr Daniel (not his real name) was quite new to the parish of Waterval and was still learning to navigate the roads that connected the communities at that time. He was also introduced to the possible dangers existing in some areas of the parish and advised to be careful in all his movements.