Author: CMM, Cape Town

Water is life

CMM, Cape Town / / Ordinary Days of the Spirit, Sunday Letter

 

Friends,

When I visited the Karoo in January this year it was 40 degrees. I fell in love with a windmill. The clunking sound followed by the swish of water surging up through the pipe. Strangely soothing. The windmill kept the reservoir dam replenished and dog and humans refreshed.

This time the Karoo was cold and wet. Very wet. Staying overnight in Laingsburg, not far from the river with bucketing rain. It was impossible not to remember the devastating floods of 1981 that are traumatised into historical memory. Rain didn’t quite stop play, but it did change the intended destination. Re-routing to Prince Albert. A very wet Prince Albert. Here I fell in love again. This time with “leiwater”. In English “lead water” just doesn’t get it. The Afrikaans sounds as if it is … flowing.

Each property with “leiwater rights” is allocated a turn – once or twice a week. Property owners have the responsibility to open and close their sluice gates accordingly – to let water into a property or to let the water pass onto a neighbour. Sometimes the allocated time is at 1 a.m. in the morning – which can’t be too much fun – but water is life. It doesn’t take a lot to imagine the number of “water wars” over the years, especially because Prince Albert tends to run out or come close to running out of water most Decembers. So, the temptation to run the leiwater a litter longer into one’s property must be devilishly difficult to resist. Furthermore, not taking one’s turn can lead to flooding for the people located at the bottom of town. So, all in all the town survives on sharing. A finely balanced neighbourliness. Which is actually true for all towns but not as easily evident. As they say: Love thy neighbourhood.

Here is a delightful story about leiwater in Prince Albert – perhaps even a parable for the role of the church.

In grace,
Alan

—

Two farmers eye-balled each other over the water furrow running alongside the main street of the tiny Karoo town of Prince Albert. This was the 1960s and water to irrigate their small-holdings was scarce. It hadn’t rained for months and the constant trickle of “leiwater” from a spring in the Swartberg Mountains was all they could rely on to feed their crops.

“You are stealing my water,” accused one, brandishing a spade. “This is my water,” spat the other also raising a spade.

Defiantly the first man tried to close the furrow into his neighbour’s dam.

“Touch that water and I will stop you with this spade.” The second lunged at his neighbour threatening to knock his knees out from underneath him. A crowd was growing to watch the fight but after a few tense minutes the second farmer closed his furrow and allowed his neighbour to have water.

“Now it’s your turn,” he said looking at his watch.

The first farmer glared at him. “Your watch is slow,” he grumbled.

“No, your watch is fast.”

Squinting under the harsh light of the Karoo the two sun-browned old men examined each other’s watches. It was true – one was too fast and the other was too slow. Neither knew for sure when his “leiwater” turn started or ended. At that moment the church clock struck the hour.

“The church clock is never wrong,” said the representative from the town’s Irrigation Board who, relieved that the spades had finally been laid down, spoke up for the first time. “Why don’t you both set your watches by the church clock and then maybe next week you won’t fight.”

Reluctantly the men changed their watches. The following week, when it was once more time for them to take water, they suspiciously studied the church clock as the “leiwater” trickled into one small dam and then the other. For the first time in years both agreed on the other’s time for water.

This story, told by the chairman of Prince Albert’s Kweekvallei Irrigation Board, Sas de Kock, highlights the importance of proper management of water in an environment where regular rainfall in unpredictable.

From that day onwards the “leiwater” turns in Prince Albert have run strictly to the time on the church clock – it’s the only way ownership of this scarce resource in the remote semi-desert village hasn’t ended in murder.

 

 

Story from: TheWaterWheel November/December2003

A time to reflect and question

CMM, Cape Town / / Sunday Letter, Trinity Sunday

 

Friends
Two Poems to Ponder and a Quote to Question.
Peace, Alan

 

Kindness

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,

feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to gaze at bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.

– ©Naomi Shihab Nye. Words Under the Words: Selected Poems. 1995

—

The Patience of Ordinary Things

It is a kind of love, is it not?
How the cup holds the tea,
How the chair stands sturdy and foursquare,
How the floor receives the bottoms of shoes
Or toes. How soles of feet know
Where they’re supposed to be.
I’ve been thinking about the patience
Of ordinary things, how clothes
Wait respectfully in closets
And soap dries quietly in the dish,
And towels drink the wet
From the skin of the back.
And the lovely repetition of stairs.
And what is more generous than a window? 

– Pat Schneider (Another River: New and Selected Poems (Amherst Writers and Artists Press, 2005).

—

“He asks of us only one thing: to move our gaze from seeing to beholding the world. He would call that Silver-Branch perception. And there the trouble begins. Because that beholding can instigate disintegration. The money-lenders flee the temple. We begin to understand the sacredness of defeat. There’s a world far bigger than our temporary ambitions. Rilke tells us it’s what we secretly long for, that defeat … that our hubris aches to kneel at immensity’s door.”

– Martin Shaw (A Hut at the Edge of the Village)

Ask yourself the following question: “What do you understand by the “sacredness of defeat”?  

Christianity is a slow-opening flower for me. All at once and it would wipe me out. Too much reality. I have to chew on one breadcrumb at a time. There are announcements of the heart so prestigious I am floored, and then lots that feels nutty and restrictive. Then a year later that in turn feels like absolute wisdom. I’m learning not to make too many pronouncements too early. One simply doesn’t know till you’ve tried, and tried for a while at that.

– Martin Shaw  (28 May 2023)

 

Practice Jubilee

CMM, Cape Town / / Pentecost, Sunday Letter

 

 

Friends,

Today we celebrate Pentecost. Many speak of Pentecost as the birthday of the church. The date of this birth is 50 days after Easter. The date is more sign or symbol than number. It is a sign or symbol of Jubilee. (Leviticus 25)

Jubilee is the principle and policy of redistribution of wealth. It is the great reset button of the economy. As former slaves fearing the return to slavery more than anything else, the ancient Hebrews built into the structure of society a mechanism of correction. They were humble and honest enough to know that despite their best efforts every 50 years society would be unequally skewed. Therefore, they made sure that those who had much did not have too much and those who had little did not have too little. Limiting inequality extended social stability. It lowered the risk of falling into permanent debt which is the slippery slope to slavery.

Pentecost is the birth of the church because it was the beginning of a community daring to live out Jubilee. The church is birthed whenever a community dares to practice Jubilee. When it makes sure all have enough and that none are in need in society. (Acts 2:43-45) Until then we are a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.

In South Africa we desperately need Pentecost. Because we desperately need Jubilee. Because we desperately need to address inequality. Because the vast majority live in desperate need.

In grace,
Alan

 

 

Witnessing Death

CMM, Cape Town / / Easter, Sunday Letter

Tuesday morning remains of Monday afternoon death.

 

Friends,

On Monday afternoon I was walking through the Company Gardens. Up ahead on the left side of the path (Government Avenue) there was a blur of movement. A person had toppled over. There was no alerting cry. No gasp or yelp. In that slouching moment breath had simply left him. He had no pulse. He was dead.

Soon there was a crowd. Respectful and concerned. The cops came. A triangle area cordoned off. The anonymous person’s body was covered by a space blanket. From outside appearance it was likely the person had been living rough for some time. An unhoused person, like so many on the city streets? He was probably younger than he looked. We wondered: “Who will let who know that their son, father, husband, brother, uncle, friend had died?” We held the sadness of the public, yet loneliness of his death. I fear this winter there will be many more lonely deaths.

Later in the evening I thought of the age-old question: “If a tree falls in the forest, and there’s no one around to hear it, does it make a sound?”  Do our lives make a sound if no one hears us? Do our lives matter if we are not noticed? Do we exist if we are never seen? Don’t we sometimes say: “They walked past me like I didn’t exist.”? Unhoused people living on the streets experience this all day every day. They are literally ignored out of existence. Spoken to and not with. They are constantly told to “move on, move on”. 

To declare faith in a God who notices every fallen sparrow is to work for the restructuring of society so that everyone is seen and recognised as precious and essential. Where no one is ignored out of existence. In these days of growing suffering may we be given strength to resist the temptation, out of anxiety and discomfort, to turn our eyes away from the heartache and pain. In all our relationships and encounters with others may we listen in such a way that we affirm not only their existence, but their sacred worth.

In grace, Alan

—

Below is the extract from Etty Hillesum’s diary [An Interrupted Life] that was quoted during
last week’s sermon.

“In the darkest years of Nazi occupation and genocide, Etty Hillesum remained a celebrant of
life whose lucid intelligence, sympathy, and almost impossible gallantry were themselves a form
of inner resistance. The adult counterpart to Anne Frank, Hillesum testifies to the possibility of
awareness and compassion in the face of the most devastating challenge to one’s humanity. 
She was killed in Auschwitz in 1943 at the age of twenty-nine.” (Quote from book cover.)

 

Sunday Morning Prayer

“Dear God, these are anxious times. Tonight for the first time I lay in the dark with burning eyes as scene after scene of human suffering passed before me.

I shall promise You one thing, God, just one very small thing: I shall never burden my today with cares about my tomorrow, although that takes some practice. Each day is sufficient unto itself. I shall try to help You, God, to stop my strength ebbing away, though I cannot vouch for it in advance. But one thing is becoming increasingly clear to me: that You cannot help us, that we must help You to help ourselves. And that is all we can manage these days and also all that really matters: that we safeguard that little piece of You, God, in ourselves. And perhaps in others as well. Alas, there doesn’t seem to be much You Yourself can do about our circumstances, about our lives.

Neither do I hold You responsible. You cannot help us but we must help You defend Your dwelling place inside us to the last. There are, it is true, some who, even at this late stage, are putting their vacuum cleaners and silver forks and spoons in safe keeping instead of guarding You, dear God. And there are those who want to put their bodies in safe keeping but who are nothing more now than a shelter for a thousand fears and bitter feelings. And they say, “I shan’t let them get me into their clutches”. But they forget that no one is in their clutches who is in Your arms.

I am beginning to feel a little more peaceful, God, thanks to this conversation with You. I shall have many more conversations with You.

You are sure to go through lean times with me now and then, when my faith weakens a little, but believe me, I shall always labour for You and remain faithful to You and I shall never drive You from my presence”.

 

 

The Joy and Grief of Mothers

CMM, Cape Town / / Easter, Sunday Letter

Melanie Kiel – mother of Dudley who was murdered 10 years ago
by a “Prinsloo Gun”.

 

Friends,

Today is Mother’s Day. A day when many families celebrate mothers with joy and gratitude. It is also a day of heightened remembrance for those whose mothers have died. And for mothers whose children have died, it is a day of heightened grief. I witnessed the heart wrenching grief of mothers this past week. Mothers recounting the killing and injury of their children from gun violence. Mothers who will feel the heightened pain of loss today.

Cape Town is not a very big place when you think about it. Communities that are just a few kilometres from each other might as well be on different continents – such is the difference in life … and death. The mothers spoke of the trauma of living in communities on the Cape Flats that are saturated with gang and gun violence. They told of the necessity to text each other before they walk to the store. “Is it safe to go now? Is it all clear?” Tragically things can change in an instant and even a text message is soon out of date. Another shooting. Another casualty. Another killing. Another grieving mother.

The mothers were speaking at the launch of a class action lawsuit brought by Gun Free South Africa and partners against the Minister of Police with the aim of: [1] Claiming for damages associated with deaths and injuries resulting from the actions of Christiaan Prinsloo for coordinating the sale of guns to gangs; [2] Addressing failures in the SAPS’ weapons and ammunition management system, which allowed Prinsloo and others to leak guns from police stores undetected, for years.

According to GFSA, in 2012, the South African Police Service began recovering an excessive number of guns on the Cape Flats that had been professionally ‘cleaned’ of identifying marks – proof that a sophisticated gun smuggling syndicate was at work. To track the supplier, two senior police officials, Major-Generals Peter Jacobs and Jeremy Vearey, registered Operation Impi in December 2013. Their investigation led to the arrest in 2015 of Christiaan Prinsloo, a Colonel in SAPS. Prinsloo confessed to his role in smuggling over 2 000 guns, that had been confiscated by, or surrendered to, the police for destruction, to gang leaders on the Cape Flats and entered a plea bargain with the State, providing detailed information on the syndicate in return for a lesser sentence. He was sentenced to 18 years but was released after serving less than four.

Operation Impi revealed that 888 of the guns stolen by Prinsloo were forensically linked to 1,066 murders in the Western Cape between February 2010 and 5 June 2016. 187 children between the ages of one and 17 years were shot and 63 killed with Prinsloo guns. [That is two Marikana Massacres – of children]. Of the 2,000+ Prinsloo smuggled guns (from which he earned R2million), 1,000 are still missing … still taking lives.

After Operation Impi received an affidavit in 2016 implicating the then President Zuma in state capture, Operation Impi was shut down and Jacobs and Vearey were demoted. A year later they challenged their demotion and won in the labour court.

You can find out more about the class action at classaction@gfsa.org.za. If you or someone you know was shot, injured or killed from between 2010 till today please inform them or their families about this class action.

One of the mothers who spoke at the launch was Avril Andres from Hanover Park. Her son Alcardo was shot and killed in 2015. She is the founder of Moms Move for Justice. Hers, like so many, is a story of tragedy and incredible resilience. Please see her story here.

In grace, Alan

For more information visit: www.prinslooguns.org.za & www.gfsa.co.za