Well my last post was from Nassau, this comes to you from Kingwood TX, a Houston suburb, as I spend Thanksgiving with my son Matthew, his wife Melissa and our first grandson Jack. I am looking forward to turkey with all the fixings but tonight (be still my heart) we will have steak!
Good beef is hard to come by on Andros so to have a nice thick steak (rare) with a nice glass of red wine is absolutely decadent.
Our priest shortage is so dramatic in the Bahamas that for me to make this trip I had to make it a Mon-Fri event. I stayed on Andros while Ginni left last week so I could be there for the weekend liturgies then, first thing Mon morning I was on the 7AM flight out of Andros to Nassau, then a quick hop to West Palm, followed by my third plane to get from FL to TX.
On Friday I will do the same gig in reverse, making sure I am back on Andros for the first Sunday of Advent.
Just before I left I realized a fantasy I have been thinking about for awhile. How to make our church on Andros more Bahamian? One of the most successful industries on Andros is the prodution of a rather unique fabric called Androsia. It is a print, coming in a wide range of colored fabrics, with designs of fish, flamingos, starfish, conche, sea horses (and the list is endless). Usually the fabric is a bright color with the print being white, with a very unique look.
This pic of a sea-grape pattern gives you an idea of what I mean.
Anyway - with the liturgical colors changing from green to purple for Advent I took our sacristan to the Androsia factory and we bought about 7' of purple Androsia fabric (pretty close to the color in the pic above, but rather than sea grapes it has schoools of fish). While I am away she will hem one length of it for the altar, and make another section into a new cloth covering our tabernacle. Having matching material will be striking, especially since our people are so used to mix and match colored alter clothes that, for the most part, they don't even realize they don't match. For example, the altar cloths for ordinary time were dark forest green, while the tabernacle was covered with a light mint green cloth and the ambo was yet another shade of kelly green. Matching purple Androsia alter linens should be a big hit.
I may not see a priest until Christmas (if even then), any priests out there want to spend Christmas in the Bahamas? With Christmas being on a Saturday, followed by the Sunday liturgies, this year I may just sleep in Church with back to back to back liturgies for 3 communities spread all over Andros.
Well, I hear my grandson coming in from playing with the boy next door (who Jack has convinced that I am really Santa with the white beard). So I think I will sign off and take time out for one more tickle fight.
Till next time
