Under the Baobab Tree

Within the last two weeks, Aquinas Secondary School has become a girls’ boarding school. And today, Valentine’s Day, Earl & I attended the 7am Mass at our parish church along with the 75 girls who are now living at our new hostel. Our pastor, Baba Patrick, celebrated the liturgy along with Bernard, an English-speaking seminarian who has become our friend, and four very reverent, well-trained altar servers. The hostel girls’ choir, all in their canary yellow skirts & Aquinas tee shirts, sang for the liturgy. And they didn’t just sing – they danced in place! With the harmonious voices, the beating drums, the ululating, the liturgical dance, the sweet incense, the bells tinkling – our Sunday liturgies are very beautiful. The hymns, even though they are in Kiswahili, are so prayerful & so uplifting that one cannot leave the church without singing on the way out. And this photo is a shot of the girls running past our front door – singing and dancing all the way home!

Strange, how the poor can be so rich—even stranger, how I am enriched by the poor.