Monday, August 27, 2012

Becoming Better Off The world would be better off if people tried to become better. And people would become better if they stopped trying to become better off. For when everybody tries to become better off, nobody is better off. Everybody would be rich if nobody tried to become richer. And nobody would be poor if everybody tried to be the poorest. And everybody would be what he ought to be if everybody tried to be what he wants the other fellow to be. Peter Maurin The Catholic Worker

Thursday, August 16, 2012

Lectio with the words of Joan Chittister If you refuse to hold things lightly, you run the risk of clinging to a thing long after it has ceased to be good for you. The trick is to hold everything in life so lightly that only death can kill us.

Monday, August 13, 2012

Wisdom

In the Book of Proverbs, we are instructed to “get wisdom.” Wisdom, in other words, is not a free gift. We are told to develop it. We are, then, required to seek meaning in life, to understand that life is not a series of events. Life is a series of learnings. Wisdom is what we are meant to cull from every event in life. Wisdom is the depth of soul that enables us to understand what must remain in our lives when everything else—the job, the health, the security, the excitement—goes, as all those things someday, inevitable, will. Lin Tang says, “The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of the nonessentials.” It is what we believe spiritually that carries us through life. It is the well of wisdom from which we are meant to draw. We must be careful as we seek wisdom not to confuse the spiritual with the religious. Religious rigidity and self-righteousness have destroyed a great deal in life. Only that which nurtures the truly spiritual in us, the search for the presence of God in every small dimension of life, is real wisdom. - Joan Chisttier

Thursday, August 2, 2012




Here is the picture that I did not include in my last post. Here is one of the groups of children that Will picks up in our tutukote! It is like the question of how many people can you stuff in a telephone booth!






Here is Diego, our assistant, with one of our sleep-over groups.

The children enjoy these sleepovers, they have a nice hot dinner, normally something fun like hotdogs, hamburgers or pizza. They get to have a hot shower, a movie and then lights out. Diego and our new teacher, Jacklyn are tutoring them on Wednesdays. We hope to grow our tutoring program once the school is finished and we have the computer lab up and running. We have had adults and children ask us about English classes which our intern, Aubrey, taught while she was with us. But I would definitely need help in this area....maybe someone out there has that calling to help teach English????!!!
Here are the kids trying out a new dance step!


We have a neighbor, Ernesto, who had an accident while digging a well and the wall collapsed on him and now he is in a wheelchair. We teach his two precious girls in our classes. Will has been doing his wound care since he has bedsores. He complained of dizziness and so will had his blood tested and found out his hematocrit is 4, normal is about 12-15. The local hospital doesn't have the ability to do blood transfusions and so I gave a pint of my own blood (thank God he and I share the same blood type!) and then we hung it and gave it to Ernesto the old fashion way. He said that he felt the difference right away. Will and the local doctor had a challenge with finding a vein in Ernesto's arm but with prayer and patience, he got his blood.
 

Here are a few pics of some of the businesses in our town: This is a little tienda that sells a little bit of everything...move over Walmart!



This is the "Home Depot" that Will buys some of our building supplies:

This is a picture of the kids that we now feed breakfast to Monday through Friday. They are pictured with our friends from Vancouver, Canada, Mark and Tracey. They got up early to help us with breakfast and Mark even became our resident tortilla maker! Tracey has a gift for organization and boy did she organize.... 
Thank you both for your love and service!
Here we are with friends at a lunch that was being thrown for a young couple are are 'getting married'...The Mayan tradition is that the bride's family throws a luncheon for relatives and if I've got this right, the couple are present at this luncheon. But later the groom's family arrives bearing the dowry for the young lady. The dowry was a huge basket of sweet white bread and cases and cases of pop. Not the most nutritious present but traditional. Aubrey shared that they also had a big basket (I think it was the bride's side) of gifts for the couple. Then certain family members go into a separate room with the couple. The family sits along the wall and the couple sit across each family member or married couples and receive advice, blessings etc., and the patriarch like a grandfather speaks over the couple. This lasts for quite some time, I think Aubrey said 'hours'. Aubrey was honored to be part of this group and shared her experience with us as we were busy with guests at our house. I find it very interesting and heartwarming because this is about family. The couple is sent back to the young man's home where he lives with his family.


The food was delicious! We had homemade soup, tamalitos (small corn tamales), chicken and vegetables and ofcourse...LOTS OF POP!!!!!