The “body shattering” cold was still hanging around, waiting probably and most diabolically to teach me a lesson or two on how not to joke with weather in temperate zones, especially while just coming out of winter. I did not know that. To me it’s springtime to celebrate the reemergence of green foliage and the blooming of flowers.
Not this Glasgow of a crazy, cold Scotland this time of the year. Or was the weather playing April Fool game with me and my “medula opologanta”? No, I’d not succumb to such intimidation. It’s Sunday and to church I must go.
St. Benedict’s Catholic Church and Parish Center, ten-minute walk from where I was “a prisoner” of otutu (cold), was my spiritual destination, at least to pray to God to help pass over the “chalice” of agony occasioned by the troubling cold. The church turned out to be a Rock of Ages. As small as it is, it unnerved me in a big way. Well heated interior with all the congregants, though in obvious winter dresses feeling at ease. Everything went well…singing, praying, delivering sermon and serving holy sacraments to the Faithful went well with Swiss watch accuracy. Within 45 minutes it was all over!
From Praise God, Alleluyah! we (my hosts and I) transited to an Allahu Akbar, post Ramadan carnival in another part of the city in the evening. And what a spectacle! The objectives of the Muslim group that organised the event included the need to get together at the end of the fasting period to mingle and rekindle interests in their Faith.
The big thing about the big do was the RECITATION from the Holy Qu’ran and QUIZ competition among the younger elements as young as five years old, the Greater Tomorrows. The big lesson is not only of “catching ‘em young” but that of “planting and wetting the tendrils” of oneness and solidarity among the Faithful in the diaspora.
What else?
We all symbolically ‘broke’ fast with lots of food and drinks, (no pork, no alcohol though) but that did not diminish the type of turbo-charged high spirit at an average OWAMBE party back at home.
Hmmm…
Sunday, that Sunday, was a Sunday that was! Wish I could have more, OTUTU or no OTUTU. Who cares?
Dele Omotunde
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