Road slump, wet season.

East Timor

I have been  cleaning shelves and cupboards, and  found one of Dan’s books.

“The Prophetic Imagination”, by Walter Brueggerman.

I read most of this  last week and would like to share some quotes with you.

P 13    The task of prophetic ministry is to nurture , nourish and evoke a consciousness and perception   alternative to the  dominant culture around us.

P 41    Passion is the capacity and readiness to care , to suffer, to die and to feel and is the enemy of imperial reality. Imperial reality intends to block out the cries of the denied ones.

P42     (He is talking as our god as alternative to the one of Pharaoh)

We are a haunted people because we believe the bad joke is rooted in the character of god, a god who is not the reflection of Pharaoh or Solomon. He is a God with a name of its name which cannot be  uttered by anyone but God. God is not a reflection of any, for God is his own person and retains that all to himself.

He is a God uncredentialed in the empire, unknown in the courts, unwelcome in the temple. And his history begins in his attentiveness to the cries of the marginal ones. He, unlike his royal agents, is one whose person is presented as passion and pathos, the power to care, the capacity to weep, the energy to grieve and then to rejoice. The prophets after Moses know that his caring, weeping, grieving, and rejoicing will not be outflanked by royal hardware or royal immunity because this one is indeed god. And kings must face that.

P 46    Clearly the regime is interested not in what people experience but in their behaviour , which can be managed

P 67    The prophetic imagination knows that the real world is the one that has its beginning and dynamic in the promising speech of God and that is true even in a world where kings have tried to banish all speech but their own.

I came down from the hills early Friday. It had rained for 14 hours till 4 am.

The 6 kilometers from Realaco Kraic to the bitumen took thirty minutes, rather than the usual eighteen. The five 5 passengers were unusually silence as we slid sideways down the steep slippery road. All safe if  you stay below  two kilometers  per hour!

 I Paid the 15 primary teachers during the week and will pay the 25 pre-school teachers next week. I had a few meetings with Dora, boss at the voc-ed school to sort out budget details and problems. I will drive to Gleno on Tuesday, to see if we have it right.

Last Sunday at Railaco Kraic, about 300 turned up for 10 am Mass with Fr Jose, our Vietnamese Jesuit parish priest. After mass there was a celebration for my jubilee. We were able to feed the 300 for under $100.  there was even change left over for the ministry.

I finally made the booking for my return to Australia. I believe two Brothers will arrive some  time in March, I will have three weeks to share my ten years with them and will leave on Monday April 9.

Bill Tynan