Covid Carols

Good King Wenceslas logged out
Feeling much dejection
All the slots had been booked out
For Tesco collection
Not deliveries there were
For his sauce and pasta
He would have to fight his way
Through the queues at ASDA
 
Angels from the realms of glory
Kindly stay right in your place
We’ve no wish to get infected
Have you heard of hands face space?
Don’t
Sing that song at us
Don’t you realise
Droplets travel further
We’ll
Have to isolate
We can’t emigrate
No way through at Dover
Wash you hands and please don’t sing
 
Now mask ye quickly gentlemen don’t mingle here today
We need your names for track and trace the church guidance doth say
Our distanced seating’s full so please book in for next Sunday
And we’re streaming on Facebook and Zoom
Meeting Room
And we’re streaming on Facebook and Zoom
 
See them dining now in Tier 4
Masks at table and an open door
All precautions so the covid spores
Don’t land on the Christmas turkey
How to eat up Brussel Sprouts for 10?
We disinvited
Aunty Gwen
At least we won’t get ugly socks again
And bits of gaudy paper chain.

While Donald watched the count at night

Saw he was losing ground

Upon his laptop did alight

And tweeted all around

"Fear not", said Pence, for mighty dread

Had seized his coiffured hair

"That Biden's old, he's got not chance

So please Boss don't despair"

All lawyers heed, clear schedules now

And double up your fee

For Trump will not admit defeat

Till 2023

Reality Check

I've just has this in an email, relaying a Zoom conversation with Christians in Madagascar. 

The diocesan economic development coordinator Ialy has recently returned from a trip to his village in the far south of the island. Good time? Patsy asked. No, Ialy said. His aunt had been used to monthly visits from his cousins, who live 75 km away in a village which is even more remote than hers. Last month they didn’t turn up; nor this month. So she decided to go and see what was happening. She travelled the 75km by ox cart, which is the usual means of transport, and arrived to find that the entire family, parents and three children, had died three days earlier from starvation. They hadn’t been able to come to town to sell their charcoal because the oxen were too weak; they themselves had been too weak to walk. So they hadn’t been able to ask for help.

 One story, one family. But that story is being repeated all over the far south of Madagascar, which falls within this huge, young diocese. They are trying to get rice and beans to the area to keep people alive.