Dear Friends, It is late in the afternoon here on Tuesday, the 29th, in Christmas week. We have had gorgeous weather today, about the best that summer can offer: low humidity and in the high 70s. I was able to swim outdoors today for about 20-25 minutes. I am now so relaxed and feeling wonderfully limp. I never lie in the sun in the afternoon, however, nor walk for long with skin exposed since the sunrays here are so, so direct. Being almost on the equator means the sun comes in straight at us and not on an angle, as is the case in the Detroit latitude at more than a 40 degree angle. One humorous event for us is a donkey that brays so mournfully every 15-20 minutes in the village that is across the river and its valley near us. Someone in the village there purchased a donkey about a month ago. It gives out this desperate sound even in the nighttime, so someone has said. I don't hear it but during the day I do and I think it is saying loud and clear throughout the valley: "I am lonely, and I want a mate!!" This reminds me of a very funny scene in one of Fellini's famous films from Italy done maybe 30 years ago. The film shows the delightful craziness of an Italian family, at table sharing a meal, at the beach, in it interaction with the clergy (usually awkward!), going on a Sunday drive, etc. There is one scene from the movie that our local donkey reminds me of. It is a scene of the oldest member of the family, a man who is a widower and perhaps 85 or so in years, senile and dependent on nursing care. One Sunday afternoon he gets loose and climbs a tree, rather far up. The family who had been out on a picnic returns to hear him in the tree calling out loudly and repeating in mournful, drawn-out cries, "I want a woman. I waaant a wooomannn!!!!" Another event that took place some 300 miles to the east of here has greatly blessed this nation. Some two weeks ago a band of Al Shabaab jihadists crossed the Somali border into Kenya and stopped at gunpoint (AK 47s) a bus filled mostly with women. The intent of these young men, covered on their heads with headwraps and wearing masks, was to separate the Christians from the Muslims and shoot the Christians right then and there. This happened twice or three times last year in roughly the same area. But the Muslim women this time refused to cooperate and even offered their burkha covering to the Christian women and then told the jihadists that they would have to kill all of the passengers together, Christians and Muslims, or they were to leave. This response apparently so stunned the terrorists that they left. The newspapers made great coverage of this story and wrote at length about what Muslims and Christians together in this nation can do when they unite and respect each other. These women did much more than what the army could have done or did. War stinks! Tomorrow morning I "go into the desert," so to speak, as I begin my own annual retreat. Some months ago I found a book that attracts me a lot. Written by Fr. Franz Jalics, a Jesuit from Hungary, and with the title: "Called to Share in HIS Life, the book maps out as ten-day retreat. It begins with simple acts of awareness in nature (so that will be my entire first day of retreat--just to look intently at what I am seeing while wandering about or sitting on a bench on our retreat house grounds). Then on day 2 I shift to a number of 30 minute meditations where with my eyes closed I focus my attention simply on the palms of my hands that are folded together in my lap and absolutely still. From there in the later days the focus shifts to more explicit spiritual, religious subjects: the mother of Jesus and then entirely on Jesus. I am to read nothing, not listen to music, eat alone and in the quiet, and of course I am not to turn on my computer. In this way I give myself to deeper and deeper quiet and deeper and deeper intimacy with God, who is beyond every image and feeling but is the ground or basis of everything and is ever present as the background or foundation of all particular objects of attention. You can imagine how important it is to be as still as possible with your body when meditating. Of course, distractions come up in the mind and imagination and feelings; that is bound to happen, but one is urged "to look beyond" such items in your attention and be aware of the divine Presence in its infinite presence, its infinite depth. With a steady faith one can reasonably hope to be blessed with an increasingly sensitive awareness of this boundless Presence who is mercy infinite, love infinite, penetrating everything and holding us all in its embrace as the most loving mother would hold her children, whether in the womb or in her arms. Does this seem too far out, too extreme? It does not seem so to me, and so I feel I am ready for such a retreat and do look forward to it, while knowing there will be times when things will seem "dead" or rather "dry" and even boring. But that is part of the entire experience: to avoid seeking certain kinds of experiences and be at peace with whatever is, aware of and present to the One who is "behind" all of this as the foundation of everything, the Source from which everyone has come and to whom we are returning. This Source is beyond all shapes, all particularity but is All, All. Anyway, I am off to dinner and wish all of you who read this a very blessed New Year, with health and joy of soul. Please remember me in your prayers. Thank you. Bernie Owens