On 31 January we read that in six years’ time the coal supply in South Africa will be insufficient to meet the country’s needs for the generation of electricity.  This is not because we don’t have enough coal.  Nor is it because the coal is of the wrong grade to run power stations.  Nor is it because we are not mining it fast enough.  Rather, it is because mining companies make greater profit selling our coal to Asian customers than on the local market. 

If you shoot, especially too accurately, we’ll condemn you as ‘trigger happy’ or even call you a ‘death squad’. If you exercise restraint, we’ll call you incompetent, cowardly or corrupt. Face it, dear police officers, in the war against crime and for our hearts and minds you will always lose.  Makes you wonder why bother, doesn’t it?

Again the situation of women in South Africa is in the spotlight. The notorious Noordt Street taxi rank and the rapes, and sexual molestation of women there; and the horrific gang rape of Ina Bonnett and murder of her son have brought the rights of women and children again to the forefront. We know that we live in a country in which women’s rights are still very much only part of the constitution. Legally we are all equal, however culturally we are not. Every day in this country many women and children are abused. These abuses happen at every level of society, rich and poor, educated and uneducated. As we sit in our churches this Sunday there are those sitting in the congregation who fundamentally do not believe in the equality of men and women. Men who believe that they have greater rights than the women in their lives. Women who believe that they are created less than men.

With much noise and expenditure and traffic confusion the ANC last weekend marked its centenary.  100 years ago the movement was founded in a small Methodist church in Bloemfontein; the current generation of ANC leaders gathered to celebrate in a large football stadium in Mangaung – what a difference 100 years can make.

Still struggling to get back into the daily grind after Christmas and New Year, you may complain: why is he so cheerful? Or: Maybe he is just being ironic. Some may even assume that we are about to reflect on the classic 1937 Walt Disney film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.  No. In fact I am trying to say something about work. Work is good. Or at least it should be.

The Church marks the first day of the New Year with the feast of Mary, Mother of God.  This is one of the oldest and also most controversial titles of Mary.  Early Christians found it hard to believe that the human Jesus can also have been God.  One idea which was rejected as heresy was that He stopped being God in order to become human and then became divine again after the Ascension.  After all, it was argued, if Jesus remained God while on earth then Mary was not just the mother of Jesus but also the mother of God.  The Council of Ephesus in 431AD decreed that this was indeed true and by giving Mary the title of ‘Theotokos’ (literally ‘the one who gives birth to God’) they were making a statement as much about the nature of Jesus as about the nature of Mary. 

To celebrate the 50^th anniversary of Vatican II, and to help deepen our understanding of it, our large network of Catholic organisations has taken the name ‘Hope&Joy’, from the Vatican II document ‘Gaudium et Spes’.  This document has the subtitle the ‘Pastoral Constitution of the Church in the Modern World’ and is one half of a pair, its twin being the ‘Dogmatic Constitution of the Church’ or ‘Lumen Gentium’.  And that Latin phrase means ‘the Light of the Nations’.

On 16 December 1838, a numerically outnumbered but better armed group of Voortrekkers defeated the Zulu army at the Ncome River in Natal. By the end of the day the river was red with Zulu blood – hence the name the Battle of Blood River.

Only 12 more shopping days till Christmas.  Panic.  Shop, shop, shop.  Panic.  What will I do?  Well, in fact, it’s 14 days.  Less need to panic.  Shops are open on Sundays now, breaking the Third Commandment: “Remember the Lord’s Day and keep it holy … by not working.” Instead we allow other people to work, keeping the shelves full of things to buy.  

The media has been saturated this last week with coverage of the UN Conference on Climate Change taking place in Durban – popularly known as COP17.  Perhaps you were hoping that church would be one place you could escape from all the ‘greenwash’.  After all, isn’t interest in the planet just something for a few eco-warriors, tree-huggers and vegetarians? Who else cares about the planet?