Kindness the Core of Islam
Islam says that all guests should be welcomed and treated with kindness and respect – Muslim or non-Muslim. Haji Daoud Nabi was at Christchurch’s Al Noor Mosque door and welcomed the shooter in to worship last Friday.
“Welcome brother,” were the last words he said before he was shot. I have heard and read so many stories about this tragedy that have torn at my heart but, it’s this scenario which keeps running and rerunning in my head. And , it’s been made even more poignant for me after seeing a photograph of Haji , a kindly elderly Afghan man with a beautiful little girl who looks so like our own grandchild.
I watched a little of the television coverage of the 2019 Academy Awards and briefly scanned the online updates from sources such as Variety and Indiewire., The was one bright moment in Olivia Coleman’s acceptance speech and the US audience ratings appeared to reverse last year’s slump, but it wasn’t essential viewing. It hasn’t been so for the past decade or more.
Apologies in advance for making your day more miserable than it need be, but a story about young murderers motivated me to find these internet articles on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Disorder:
Note to self: Must stop going to the welcoming sunshine of Nelson. Not because I dislike the place – that’s impossible. It’s because the visits usually coincide with calamities of one sort or another.
Like most New Zealanders I’ve never been to Waitangi and doubt I’ll ever get there. What I’ve seen on TV has very often been divisive. However, a few years ago I happened to be in Oamaru on Waitangi Day.The event was celebrated a few miles from town. We drove over a grass track through a field ready to harvest sun-flowers. 
It’s a risky business looking beneath the surface of the social media midden, but hard to resist when the subject is close to your heart. I lived and worked in South Africa in 1963-64, where the reality of apartheid became a shocking formative experience for me. I’ve since keenly followed the politics of author Alan Paton’s ‘Cry The Beloved Country’, his lament for the arrival of a rigidly segregated country.
“Six o’clock!” she cried and the bedsheets undid. “We’ll miss the bus. Won’t catch the plane!”
How quickly 2018 passed, Time now to pause, look back and reflect on your priorities in this brand New Year!