The Jolleys in Kenya (6)

Continuing news from the sabbatical travels of the vicar and his family …

Off Duty – Mombasa

For the past week we have been enjoying warmer weather around Mombasa. Mombasa is Kenya’s second largest city and is its main port. It also has many more Muslims than elsewhere in Kenya. For the first four days we stayed at the Anglican Church of Kenya’s (ACK) guest house just to the south of Mombasa. We shared the facilities, including a fine swimming pool recently reopened by the new Archbishop, with large groups of young people who had come for holiday residentials. Their enthusiastic singing was a joy to listen to, and an interesting contrast with the calls to prayer from the nearby mosques. Less joyful was the effect of the power cuts (see our earlier entry’s In the News), which left us without running water as well as electricity for a good chunk of our stay.

At the heart of Mombasa is Fort Jesus, built by the Portuguese in the late 16th century, but taken by Omani Arabs after a bloody siege a hundred years later. For Jesus’ name to be associated with this place which has been a centre for slavery, torture and ruthless slaughter at first seems most inappropriate. However, in Jesus’ ministry and passion he sought out such places, and he still wants to bring life and goodness out of evil places.

We finished off our time at the coast with three days north of Mombasa at Nyali Beach Holiday Resort. It’s fair to say that the budget required was rather more than that needed for the ACK guest house, though the hot showers made it well worth it!

In the News – The Census

Monday 24th August was census day for Kenya. Well, actually it marked the start of census week, as it will take the many enumerators several days to get round some of the more remote communities. With Tuesday 25th August being a public holiday, so (just as in the story of Jesus’ birth) many people have returned to their home towns and villages to be counted.

The most controversial aspect of the census has been the question about people’s tribe. In the light of the post-election violence of early 2008, when tribal tensions boiled over, many were concerned that the information could be misused for further violence and ethnic cleansing. Others felt excluded by the tribal definitions. Nevertheless the question remained in the list of information to be provided.

On Sunday morning, the day before the census, the Bishop of Mombasa was at St Peter’s church, Nyali (near where we were then staying). He took time at the start of his sermon to the packed church to strongly encourage participation in the census, citing the various texts in the Bible which showed them in anything like a vaguely positive light. Using Matthew 13:24-30 (the parable of the wheat and the weeds) as his text, he then went on to speculate what a census of the church would show if there was a question about true and pretend believers.

Previous updates from the Jolleys in Kenya can be found in the downloads section of the website.