GLIMPSES OF THANKSGIVING!!
Emmanuel | Tuesday, November 30th, 2010 | 12 Comments »A lot to be grateful for this Thanksgiving! Here are some glimpses from my end in the last month and half:
….(October- November): my brother Joe spending four weeks with me here – for him a time of rest and renewal (following his 25th priestly anniversary in July); and for he and I time to catch up, remember, and renew friendship (Emerald Isle, NC)
but also a time to dream….. (planning meeting for Joe’s Bethany Miracle Village)
… the honor of being selected as one of five recipients of Duke University’s Thomas Langford Lectureship Award (‘designed to provide Duke’s faculty with an opportunity to hear about the ongoing scholarly activities of their recently promoted colleagues’). At the Nov 9th lecture entitled: Pursuing Reconciliation in Africa: Stories from Bethany, I share about my research at the intersection of World Christianity and Reconciliation studies respectively.
Nov 19-22: spending a weekend down in Northport, Fl visiting Chester and Roberta Blais – friends since 1993 (Elkhart, Indian) and celebrating their 55thwedding anniversary! A simple but beautiful mass with the renewal of vows, followed by a hearty breakfast brunch with some of their close friends, is a good way to celebrate the gifts of Roberta and Chester’s friendship and intimacy.
-Nov 27: A 50th birthday anniversary this weekend (27 Nov)!
A quote from Gregory Boyle,’s Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion (highly recommended) frames it all very well for me: Quoting William Blake, Fr. Boyle notes: “We are put on earth for a little space that we might learn to bear the beams of love.” (xiii)
I am indeed grateful for all the beams of love these last 50 years! I am so grateful for each and all of you who are helping me to learn to bear the beams – thus, helping to return me to my true self.
Indeed we have a lot to be thankful for.
So grateful to the Lord for the 50 years’ birthday. We thank God for the many achievements, for many lives you’ve touched, indeed for the “beams of love” borne in the “little space” so far spent on earth. In your life some of us are beginning to appreciate that indeed “Africa matters.”
May your “little space” be longer than the 50 years so far spent.
Congratulations
Great! Always good to remember to be grateful, even to the self. A friend of mine says, “Never wait for others to congratulate you because they may never; whatever you deem an important achievement in your life, whether others recognize it or not, celebrate it and congratulate yourself.
” (to end the above quote!)
Fr. Emmanuel,
It was so nice to see you and Joseph at the Fitzgerald’s home a few weeks ago. I am considering a trip to Uganda sometime in the coming year, but I don’t know when just yet. Dan may travel to Lesotho as part of Engineers Without Borders sometime during the year – we will see what the plans become. Did you know that there is a Duke student chapter of Engineers Without Borders with a project in Uganda? GH has definitely raised enough money for 1 new water harvesting tank for Fr. Charles and we are more than 2/3rds the way to a second one. The project will be done through STB. Have a wonderful Christmas holiday.
Peace,
Jean
Happy Birthday Emmanuel! I give thanks to God for you, and rejoice with you in the joy that has been God’s gift to you this season. You are a gift to me, so the joy is circling round us. With love, Gann
Emma, happy birth day. We give thanks to God for all he has enabled you to accompolish during these past 50 years and ask him to continue to keep you strong.
I enjoyed my stay with you. You are a great host!!!
Happy birthday, Emmanuel!!!
It’s great to see both you and Joe in the photos. Many congrats to Joe on his silver jubilee too. Hope you are both well – and may the loving God continue to shower with blessings.
I put my message in the wrong slot!!!
Kulika nnyo amazaalibwa aga 50! Except for the white head you look like 30 only…. Wangaala Ssaabasomesa ate enfiirabulago yange. Akuume nnyo.
Ssebo,
Weebale kuwangaala myaka egyo!
I will always reminder you how you are an inspiration to many of us. Your 50 years have been well spent and lived. You have worked hard to leave a legacy behind. Your determination to work for peace and reconciliation in our mother continent is one of the many things I admire from you.
May you live to realize all your good dreams!
Wangaala!
Dear Emmanual,
Happy belated birthday from the Swygart family! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with 44 family members at our home for dinner. It was also our 32nd wedding anniversary on Thanksgiving this year. Greg, Mary Beth, Drew and Ephrem were here. Joe and Bethany could not come. They just bought a home in Tallahassee, FL where he is a student. We are going to visit Suzy and Kyle in Texas this weekend. Congratulations on your honor from Duke. Your work is important to us and we hold you very dear. Thankls to God for the blessing of you in our lives. Dan and Monica
Rabbi,belated but particulary accentuated is my message of congratulations to you.A big portion of your 50 years has been spent as a midwife to many. As for me, i have been born many times on to new stages in life. Many blessings Emmanuel.
Hi Emmy,
50 years of existence are a great milestone on life’s journey and accordingly deserve acknowledgement and gratitude to God. Not too many, not too few – just midway at the threshold of one phase of life into another. And precisely for this, they provide such a rare and precious vantage point of pausing to reflect on the meaning of life, the years lived and those still to come.
To fail to appreciate God’s beams of love would be very mean of us! We are continuously bathed in these beams that present in different forms. Ironically, they zoom on us the best in our tough moments. In retrospect, like one waking up from heavy sleep, we come to really appreciate them as none other than God’s beams of love. Happy birthday and hearty congratulations upon all your achievements. Carry on the good work brother.