AS we have tried to portray in this issue, SA is a country undergoing profound social change: a country which has become a citadel of terrible fear, misery and utter poverty. Example: the Salvation Army, one of the West’s truly great Christian organisations, has this month been forced to close its old age home in Durban. State subsidies to old age homes have been slashed, as they have to children’s homes, social welfare organisations and feeding schemes.

Day by day, more people, Black and White alike, join our harsh and unforgiving economic underworld, a situation largely created for us by our good friends in the US, self-proclaimed home of human rights, its own citizens enjoying the highest standard of living the world has ever known. What’s worse, they - or, at least, their New World Order chieftains - knew exactly what they were about: that the ANC and its Marxist mentors could not possibly administer a sophisticated economy such as we once enjoyed.

Rescue, the small volunteer charity run by Hennie Kok, APN and a few others, has once again been able to stagger on. Des Thompson of Cape Town gave us a big helping hand when he said that, if we could sell a brand-new set of Encyclopaedia Britannica, we would get a handsome cut. We did - and we did get R2 500 as a result. Thanks to both seller and buyer.

A near-neighbour gave me R1 000, as did a Spanish family who bought Hennie’s farm. Our truly marvellous friends at the Immanuel Church at Randburg gave us another R500, and Lions International too regularly contribute R500. The NG Church in Linden gave us 80 good quality blankets, and an Asian family, after a festival, gave us 100 loaves of white bread, mutton and big box full of cut cake.

We remain immeasurably grateful to Pick ‘n Pay who give us weekly supplies of fresh fruit, an unheard of luxury for so many of our poor little White kiddies. We are grateful, too, to Rembrandt Butchery and printer Japie Stander, both of Linden and both of whom lend us their trucks when we need to pick up big items. And, once again, thank you to all of you have given us clothing, so urgently needed.

Hennie and I hate asking for handouts, but if you can help us financially, please deposit it in favour of Mission Rescue, Volkskas Bank, Northcliff, account No 07 381 75 166. To all of you who do help us out so magnificently, a huge thank you. Where we would be without you, I don’t even want to think.