Alexandra is in mourning following the death of one of its illustrious sons who provided soothing sermons in times of hardship.
Born on 3 October 1946, Father Ronald Cairns (OMI) of St Hubert Parish of the Catholic Church situated on the border between Alexandra and Wynberg, died on 6 February 2021 at about 5pm.
One end of the church, the western side is on Watt Street in Wynberg while the eastern side of it is on 1st Avenue in Alexandra, a compromise reached with the apartheid government which had objected to a white person living in a predominately black community.
Father Cairns, writing to his peers about his posting to St Hubert Parish in Alexandra in July 1981 said, “I had two jobs to do, to rebuild the parish and secondly I believe to serve the whole community of Alexandra.
“I belong to an order of priests called the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, and our basic mission statement, if you want to put it that way, is to seek, to serve the greatest needs, to leave nothing un-dared for Christ, and to love and serve those most in need and the poorest of the poor.
“Well you [peers] had all the opportunity to do that in Alexandra, and at that time particularly, everyone was really poor, poor in every way spiritually, psychologically from the oppression, mentally, politically in every way.
“So I set about on those two tasks, I visited every single home in Alexandra at that time and the hostels and to be honest with you I didn’t have any success. And then I said I cannot carry on this way. So I actually consecrated the parish and the township to God through his Mother Mary.
“From that moment onwards look what’s happened. I now have two full churches on Sunday, that’s about 1 600 and we also have every day from 60 to 300 people at church.
“Now that’s quite something isn’t it, I mean, you know from nothing you see, and many confessions, people coming all day for this or that or counselling. I average from 15 to 31 people a day coming here to the office.”
