November 2020

Fr. Jean-Marie Kuzituka Did’ho, SIP South Africa

​This world we all know was running to its ruin with extremist capitalism, corruption, terrorism and wars, but no one could find the emergency stop button, this gigantic machine called the world was suddenly stopped by a very small parasite invisible to the naked eye, a small virus of nothing at all.
 
What an irony? We are forced to stand still and do nothing. Many questions are asked without clear answers. Some ask, what will happen afterwards? When will the world resume its normal course? What will happen after the virus has been defeated? What will our life be like afterwards?

​The long confinement has made people to rediscover how good and bad it is to spend time with loved ones. Lockdown has made people to differentiate between needs and wants, between desires and lusts. It has made us realize that a human being has never been and never will be all powerful.  Lockdown has made us realize that we are limited and fragile beings. The Covid-19 pandemic has made us to appreciate one another.
We started appreciate and applaud workers in the past we never acknowledged such as medical staff, garbage collectors, bakers, bus and taxi drivers, politicians and/or government officials. Yes, I have written politicians and government officials because during this long confinement we have rediscovered the meaning of the service of the State and why we must register and vote during elections.
 
During lockdown, we also came to realize the importance of faith-based organization, those who in one way or another are of service to their neighbor. All these we call it Wisdom, Gratitude and above all Love. 
 
The long queues in front of the stores have helped us to rediscover that time does not belong to us and we took advantage of this time to talk to one another as we waited for our turn to buy a loaf of bread or some vegetables. Nobody is in hurry because I have to go back to work. We came to realize that ‘time’ is not really ‘money’ as the world says, but that ‘time’ belongs to its creator-God who gave it to us without pay. Time is
therefore not money. Time is a gift to be tasted and to be used for the lifting up of one another. With this pandemic, we learned to be patient. Individualism and egocentrism are replaced with sisterhood and brotherhood.
 
The Church certainly for the first time, worldwide, has experienced empty churches in Easter as was the empty tomb of our Lord on the resurrection day. Come Holy Spirit in our empty world.