19-01-2010
A locally supported partnership of churches and individuals in Scotland
with those involved in ministry and mission in South Africa
with those involved in ministry and mission in South Africa
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Dear Friends,
For us Christmas was relatively quiet though we were delighted to have our son, David, and Sandra's aunt Nan with us. We spent Christmas Day with them, Susan, Richard and Nicole and those who were still at Sedibeng (those who come from other African countries and were not able to go home) for a braai.
We all received a great Christmas present when there was a downpour in the evening and the summer rains started, though they were very late and some farmers had already given up hope of getting a crop this year. Fortunately the rains are still falling regularly and this has been a relief in that we have escaped the heat of the summer this year.
As Easter approaches we are becoming more and more conscious that our contract with the Church of Scotland is coming to an end. It is very difficult for us to write a partner letter in this atmosphere as we still do not know what the future holds for us, and as the time grows closer we feel the anxiety and stress gripping us and making it difficult to function as well as we have had in the past.
The Church and university are still looking at ways in which they can form a partnership and enable us to continue the work we are doing. The problem, as always, is finance and we are very grateful to those of you who have been working on our behalf; we hope that our prayers will be answered and God will clearly guide us where He wants us to go.
We had a very hectic and busy start to the New Year. All of our new students arrived and have now well settled into life at Sedibeng. We were gifted bicycles from Laurieston congregation in Falkirk last year and they have been such a huge success. It is wonderful to see our students all riding their bikes to the university in the mornings – and they tell me that they are so appreciative of the exercise that they are getting.
We have nine candidates from the UPCSA, our own church; this has meant that we had empty rooms at Sedibeng. Sandra has been able to rent out the rest of the accommodation to ministers who are doing either Masters or PhD studies full time. And so, once again, we have a full house at Sedibeng with different cultures and backgrounds trying to live together in Christian harmony.
This year we have been better organised with food, and of course Sandra and Nuzuko have learned a great deal from some of their mistakes from last year. We have a budget of £1 per day per student for food!
As you can imagine this is not very much at all so it is quite a challenge to budget. Fortunately many of you have sent donations to help in our work and we have resorted to using some of your donations to subsidise the food bills when necessary. We want to thank you very much for this indeed as, without this, some of our guys would literally starve as many of them cannot even find the £1 per day. For this we provide them with breakfast and dinner at night.
We try to give them a well balanced nutritional meal with plenty of fruit and vegetables which fortunately are not so expensive here in South Africa. Sandra has been able to make an arrangement with Woolworth's (Marks & Spencer food stores here in SA). When their products reach their sell-by date they have to come off the shelf as they do in the UK. Sandra approached one of their branch managers to find out what they did with this food. He has agreed to an arrangement where she can come and buy it as waste for from between 50% - 80% discount on all items.
All the perishables such as bread, milk, fruit and vegetables are marked at the higher discount and most of the meat we get at a 50% discount when it is available. This has proven to be such a boon and the students are getting good quality food very regularly. It is more time-consuming for Sandra as she has to go shopping almost every day, being the only driver, and she struggles with the budget but it does mean that our students are getting a good quality diet, which is essential here as part of the fight against HIV/AIDS.
Thanks to your donations, Sandra was able to find a cooking course for Nuzuko who helps her at Sedibeng. She completed the course at the end of last year and has taken over the bulk of the cooking now from Sandra. She has done very well and we are proud of her achievement.
On Monday evenings at Sedibeng we do a course of Transactional Analysis with the community. This was something we learned early on in our career as Mission Partners through the Church of Scotland Group Relations Unit, and over the years have found it to be a useful tool in relationships, particularly with cross-cultural misunderstandings. We are finding it to be useful for the life of the community where the students are learning a way to deal with the problems and difficulties of living so closely together in community. We can also deal with issues before they become so blown out of proportion that conflict gets out of hand!
On a Tuesday night we have Communion followed by a community dinner. We try to have guest preachers – a couple of weeks ago we had visiting elders from the Church of Scotland and he and his wife shared with us.
Graham also runs a Ministerial Formation class; this is really for our own students, teaching them what it means to be Presbyterian, church law and polity and Reformed Tradition. Some of the other residents have joined in these classes and appear to be very interested in the workings of the Presbyterian Church. We may not have mentioned that we do not restrict Sedibeng to Presbyterians only; we have tried hard to give it an ecumenical flavour, although pretty obviously it is for the needs of our own church.
Some of you will have met Joyce and Caroline the two nurses from Alva congregation in Stirling Presbytery who came to assist Sandra two years ago with her HIV/AIDS work. They are returning again this year just before Easter. This time we are taking them to the Eastern Cape which is the poorest province in SA and where they will come face to face not only with AIDS but all the other factors such as extreme poverty and poor social conditions which enables this disease to continue spreading. Many people come back 'home' from the city to die in the embrace of their families.
We shall drive them there – 10 hours – to arrive in time for the Easter celebrations which are quite a unique experience for anyone from overseas. The Eastern Cape is the home of the Xhosa people and they celebrate Easter in such a wonderful manner that it is a privilege to be able to go there and share this time with them, and to let Joyce and Caroline experience this event. They will be based in the TP Finca congregation of the Presbytery of Umthatha.
On the family front we are very proud to share that Susan has completed her degree at Pretoria University and will be graduating in May. She was one of the top 10% in her class and has been invited to continue with honours in Sociology which she has already begun.
Nicole has learned to swim and swims like a fish – she just wants constantly to be in the pool with her granddad! She has started ballet lessons and seems to really enjoy them; we keep having these demonstrations which we have also to copy! Ellis our grandson in the UK has started school – we cannot believe that he is 5 years old already!
We take this opportunity to wish you all God's blessings for this Easter time. Lots of love!
Sandra and Graham
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