Post 8: Middle Eastern Children's Alliance and the MAIA project

Hi everyone,

We had quite a swell of support from the Prince of Peace community this week! Welcome to everyone who signed up. Please let me know if you do not wish to receive these blogs. We are on our No-Show Pilgrimage for another week. On Sunday, we'll be collecting contributions to help build a water purification system at a primary school in GAZA. If you would like to be part of this you can contribute by sending to Prince of Peace - MAIA Project: 12500 Carmel Ave. NE, Abq, NM  87122.

There was a question sent to our email asking about other projects that we can support. The Maia Project, the water systems for schools in Palestine, is part of the Middle East Children's Alliance. They have several outreach programs: support for women's organizations; work with traumatized children; scholarships; the Rachel Corrie Center in Rafah (the border town between Gaza and Egypt) and others. We'll start with water and work our way up!  Very interesting activity at the Rachel Corrie Center is a simple pen pal program for children - We'll post the instructions during the week if anyone knows of a class or group of children who would like to be involved.

Also, we received the following link:   http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/08/opinion/08friedman.html?_r=1&ref=opinion to a very interesting article about the escalating possibility of war throughout the region.

Living water, that's what we are asking. Share your living water: learn the truth about Palestine and Israel and breathe it into life for the next week. Let our Lord Jesus direct you in your giving to help us build a commitment to Palestine at Prince of Peace through this water project. We'll need $11,500 to finish one site. If we need to, we'll reach out to other churches and groups in Albuquerque. Let us know if we can speak at your parish or to your community.

Here are two other links that may shed more light for you:

1. A site about Rachel Corrie an American Student living in Palestine who was killed by Israeli soldiers when she was protesting the destruction of a home.
http://www.rachelcorrie.org/

2. Boycott of Israel/War defined a little more clearly:
http://www.boycottisraeltoday.com/caterpillar

Serenity Prayer

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;
and the wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
Forever in the next.

Amen.

Take Care Dear Ones,

Peggy