By Matthew D. Ruhl, S.J.
Thursday, July 31, 2019, Punta Gorda, Belize
It is official. We have scared up the money necessary to accomplish our basketball court. Two things: there won’t be room enough for a five-aside soccer field; we do have enough room and money for a full-sized court that will be used for pick-up games and the games of organized programs. Through this blog we raised $24,800.00. A donor stepped up to cover the difference. Work will begin in August. Thank you all so much for your donations. I am terribly grateful and so is St. Peter Claver Parish. This is a very good thing for Punta Gorda.
On Saturday morning our Sacristan spied a tommy goff slithering into the church organ. These venomous snakes are the number-one killing snake in the region. A snake man was called. He dispatched our poisonous intruder without incident.
On Sunday night a freak storm hit Punta Gorda. The wind blew tile and chunks of concrete off our roof and sent them sailing over the roof and into our parking lot. I cannot imagine the wind speed that would carry 2-3 lb. chunks of concrete. We lost a tree or two and lots of branches. In windy storms the tiles of our indoor drop-ceilings rattle and lift. Sometimes that action distresses certain beasts who have made their home in the ceiling. On Monday morning our Local Superior, Tom Greene, who is spending a couple of days with us, woke to an irritated bat dive bombing him. Welcome to PG!
July 31st being the Feast of St. Ignatius, Fr. Quang Tran, S.J. and Local Superior Tom Green, S.J. found themselves in PG involved in a couple of summer programs here and in the village of San Marcos with a group from New Orleans. Shrimp and fish were happily consumed. As fate would have it, one of the volunteers was the brother of a woman I worked with at a Boy’s Hope summer camp 32 years ago in Canada, Owakonze.