Life Is A Banquet

It was yet another windy day in Cape Town! Our accommodations are located near the base of Table Mountain. In having made this journey twenty-three times, I must admit that this year’s windy conditions have made for interesting times. Our day began by going to the Institute for the Healing of Memories. I was honored to introduce my friend and colleague, Fr. Michael Lapsley to the delegation. Michael is an Anglican priest and founder of the Institute for the Healing of Memories. The Institute has worked closely with Archbishop Desmond Tutu in the past by bringing about truth and reconciliation in a post apartheid South Africa. The Institute remains committed to the mission of healing the deep scars of systemic racism for the last twenty-four years. Arm In Arm In Africa is honored to partner with Fr. Michael by financially supporting their mission.

We returned to the township of Guguletu for an afternoon of home visits. We were able to spend time with the more senior members of the JLZWANE Presbyterian Church. The majority of these individuals were forcibly relocated from their homes in the 1950’s and 60’s to begin life in the apartheid driven black townships. I particularly enjoy spending time with the generation that stood up to the tyranny of racism and believed in doing the work of justice. AIAIA partners with the JLZWANE Church and Center by providing much needed food parcels for this community.

In honor of our many partnerships in South Africa, I share these words from Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Worker movement;

“We cannot love God unless we love each other, and to love, we must know each other. We know God in the breaking of the bread, and we know each other in the breaking of the bread and we are not alone anymore. Heaven is a banquet and life is a banquet too, even with a crust, where there is companionship. We have all known the long loneliness and we have learned that the only solution is love and that love comes with community.”

Peace and reconciliation,
James Cassidy, President AIAIA