I visited a care home today and talked to a man of 99. He had lived happily alone all his life until being forced out by people who cruelly robbed his modest home. I talked to another woman of over 90 who had been born and brought up in the farm house that had become the care home. Both these two wonderful people had a calmness I could only envy.

The Prophet Amos again:

Hear this, you who trample the needy
and do away with the poor of the land

I will turn your religious feasts into mourning
and all your singing into weeping.

(Amos 8:4-6, 9-12)