Monday, February 16, 2004

What's been up...

Monday late afternoons at our pad, Monday Evenings at Cambria, and Wednesday late afternoons at Kathy's pad, we have toutoring for some of the youth in our neighborhhod going on. What is exciting to us is that some of the college age folks from our neighborhood are toutoring and mentoring some of the younger youth in our neighborhood.

"Each one Teach one," a saying adopted by the HipHop community was started by the famous Christain educator Frank Laubach.

This past Friday I went with the LA InnerChange team and my Christian Spirituality class to the retreat center Mater Dolorosa. We enjoyed a 6 hour silent retreat... (well actually 3 hours and then lunch and then 2 hours). The retreat center is about the passion of Christ... a good context to prepare for lent and for Mel Gipson's film
The Passion of Christ. God spoke to my heart that this lent will be another step towards understanding that "Even death rightly understood and embraced can become a form of grace" (the late Dr. James Loder). I hope to write more about this time later.

Saturday I felt compelled to stay and work while Jude went to celebrate her dad's 80th birthday with Roxy. This was a very difficult decision. There were numerous happenings that came together that confirmed that maybe I was hearing from God on this one. Jude's dad goes into surgery on Febuary 24th to have one of his kidney's removed because of cancer...

Lunch became an oportunity to gather Kathy, Miriam, and three other teens from the neighborhood for lunch. One guy who had been depressed for about a month came out of his depression. One guy who longs to belong now feels included. Afterwards we went to the public library... and the downtown LA Public library has now become a destination for us -- Cool.

Sunday I spent a significant amount of time with Miriam and Norma. Two compassionate souls that have lived the struggle of the imigrant journey so common to my neighborhood. I am glad to participate and encourage with their desire to share their faith and all that they have learned from their journey.

Monday I had a significant mentoring time with Rikkell. Then had the privelege of toutoring Chris, Tony's brother and helping them move towards knowing how to help Chris grow in his reading capacity.

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