WORLD WATER DAY

Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent

Readings of the day: RB 43:1-12 Latecomers for the Work of God or in the Refectory

Mass: Gn 17:3-9; Resp Ps 105; Jn 8:51-59

Thompson Creek

Access to safe drinkable water is a basic and universal human right, since it is essential to human survival and, as such, is a condition for the exercise of other human rights.

(Encyclical Letter Laudato Si, 30)

It’s pouring rain here on World Water Day. I share scattered ‘musings on water’. As a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, I am familiar with the phrase: ‘A Peace Corps Volunteer doesn’t look at a glass as half empty or half full. She looks at it and says, “Hey, I could bathe in that!”’ I gained a great appreciation for water while serving in the Republic of South Africa. While living with a gogo (grandmother) in a dusty, hot, and dry village, there was a time when we went for one week with no water coming from the taps. At other times, the water supply was limited. We had to be sure our buckets were full at all times not knowing when the water supply would be shut off. Thankfully, my wise gogo had an emergency supply of water in the shed in the backyard. One day, to build character I think, she sent me along to the river to collect a bucket of water and carry it home on my head. I was not quite as adept at the task as my companions from the village. I saw small children pushing rickety wheel barrows from one side of a village to another to collect containers of water from a water tank. This task they did every morning before school. There I was coming from a culture that can take water for granted. For most of us, we go to the tap and fresh, clean, potable water comes out. If we are not satisfied with that, we go and buy bottled water. Many carry water bottles everywhere they go so as to remain hydrated. Not that we are going to stop doing these things today, but it can’t do much harm to reflect upon how blessed we are.

To defend the earth and to safeguard water is to protect life.

(Pope Francis, Twitter, March 22, 2018)

WHOEVER DRINKS THE WATER I SHALL GIVE WILL NEVER THIRST;

THE WATER I SHALL GIVE WILL BECOME IN HIM A SPRING OF WATER WELLING UP TO ETERNAL LIFE.

(Jn 4:14)