All saints' feast. I did not have any appointments and therefore took the day to visit two more outstations where I have not been yet. As I always do, it is only spoken between the bishop and the local priest but the people are never told about it.
I therefore told Fr Mahazule - parish priest at Mater Dolorosa (Mbabane) - that I was available to visit the two oustations we kept postponing for different reasons: Maryward and Lundzi.
They are the two furthest ones from the parish both because of the distance and the type of road. It takes a good hour to reach any of them. Going during the rainy season requires a much better vehicle than mine. A sunny day like this one was an ideal one.
At Maryward the community meets at the Catholic primary school and at Lundzi they do so at the house of a family who makes a place available.
As usual, great surprise at seeing the bishop arriving. They knew one day I would be visiting but they never knew it would be on this day.
One of the things we would like to do during this "Extraordinary Missionary Year" is to make sure that all our communities "have a name". Some, like these two, are just called by the name of the area or the name of the school that hosts them. I explained it during Mass as we celebrated the feast of "All Saints". They would present to me three possible names in order of importance to them and I will choose one of them. The news was welcomed with great joy.
At the end of Mass at Lundzi I was asked to go and see the place where they would like to build their church. Someone probably wondered if "the bishop would walk that distance" but - thank God - they were reminded I do it every year for much longer ones during our diocesan pilgrimage.
A church would certainly make an impact as the land they secured is more central for all the families to attend and would allow for a bigger place.
They have already fenced it and they look forward to seeing a dream come true!
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| Some of the members of the community at "the gate" of the new plot |
