My sermon for Rosh Hanshanah Day 5769 was something of a sequel to the one I delivered the night before. I’ve reworked it here, based on a version I gave today at Lake St. Church’s World Community Sabbath. (Those of you who read the previous sermon will notice I carried some passages over into this [...]
Archive for the ‘Poverty’ Category
The End of Empire: A Sermon for Rosh Hashanah
Posted in Elections 2008, Energy Efficiency, Energy Policy, Environmentalism, Health Care, High Holidays, Judaism, Politics, Poverty, Religion, Sermons, War on October 5, 2008 | 3 Comments »
The Season of our Sustenance: A Sermon for Erev Rosh Hashanah
Posted in Environmentalism, Fair Trade, Global Activism, Green Buildings, HIV/AIDS, High Holidays, Hunger, International Aid, Judaism, Poverty, Religion, Sermons, Spirituality, Tzedakah on October 2, 2008 | No Comments »
As I sat down to write my sermons this New Year, I somehow found myself returning to the theme of “sustainability.” Click below for my remarks on Erev Rosh Hashanah:
JRC Says Farewell to Africa
Posted in Africa, Education, Fair Trade, International Aid, International Health, JRC Africa Trip 2008, Poverty, Religion, Rwanda, Uganda on July 24, 2008 | 1 Comment »
On our final day in Africa, we visited the Nankusi and Namanyonyi primary schools, both of which are supported by the Peace Kawomera’s fair trade social premiums. Both schools are engaged in building projects to create more classrooms and more essential educational resources. In each school we saw overcrowded classes (many cramming in over 100 [...]
Peace Kawomera in Action
Posted in Africa, Coexistence, Fair Trade, Interfaith, JRC Africa Trip 2008, Peace, Poverty, Religion, Uganda on July 23, 2008 | 1 Comment »
We’ve learned a great deal about how coffee is grown and processed on this trip and one of the most indelible lessons we’ve taken away is how interconnected and interdependent each step is to the next. Unlike the major commercial producers, rural coffee farmers like those of the Peace Kawomera coop must depend upon one [...]
Harvesting Peace
Posted in Africa, Fair Trade, Global Activism, Interfaith, JRC Africa Trip 2008, Judaism, Peace, Poverty, Religion, Uganda on July 21, 2008 | 1 Comment »
As promised, we went to the Abayudayah Jewish community on Shabbat morning for services. It was actually a fairly auspicious time to be visiting: last week their new spiritual leader, Rabbi Gershom Sizomu, was formally installed in his home community. Rabbi Gershom has been studying for the past several years at the Conservative movement’s Ziegler [...]
Return to Nantandome
Posted in Africa, Global Activism, HIV/AIDS, International Aid, International Health, JRC Africa Trip 2008, Poverty, Uganda, Water, Women's Issues on July 17, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Today was another full day for our group. It was completely devoted to a visit to the Foundation for the Development of Needy Communities (FDNC) - an NGO that JRC visted three years ago during our first Africa delegation.
In April 2005 JRC was the first group hosted by FDNC, on a trip made in [...]
Sustainable Development from Rwanda to Uganda
Posted in Africa, Fair Trade, HIV/AIDS, International Aid, International Health, JRC Africa Trip 2008, Poverty, Rwanda, Uganda on July 16, 2008 | 1 Comment »
We’re in Uganda now, after one night in Kampala and a four hour plus bus ride to the town of Mbale. Before I report on Uganda, tho, I want to write about our final visit in Rwanda: a stop at the Millennium Village Project in Bugasera (which is in the same district as the Nyamata [...]
“Amahoro” Means Shalom
Posted in Africa, Children's Rights, HIV/AIDS, Health Care, Human Rights, Hunger, International Aid, International Health, JRC Africa Trip 2008, Poverty, Rwanda on July 13, 2008 | No Comments »
On Shabbat we began our day with a study and discussion of the Torah portion - the central themes of Parshat Pinchas (zealous violence and its complex aftermath) were uncannily appropriate to our experiences of the past few days.
The central experience of our Saturday was a visit to CHABHA (Children Affected By HIV/AIDS) - an [...]
Kaddish at Nyamata
Posted in Africa, Genocide, HIV/AIDS, Health Care, Human Rights, International Health, JRC Africa Trip 2008, Poverty, Rwanda on July 12, 2008 | 1 Comment »
In my previous post I mentioned an emotional visit to Kigali’s public hospital - that actually doesn’t even begin to do justice to the intensity of our experience. Mardge Cohen arranged the visit for us, to give us a better sense of the Rwandan health care system. Until this visit, we had only seen privately [...]
A Legacy of Pain and Hope
Posted in Africa, Genocide, HIV/AIDS, Holocaust, Human Rights, International Health, JRC Africa Trip 2008, Poverty, Rwanda on July 11, 2008 | 2 Comments »
Day 2 in Rwanda:
Our first two destinations were two local community associations that are supported by WE-ACTx. Icyuzuzo is an association of Rwandan widows located in the Nyamirambo district. Icyuzuzo (Kinyarwanda for “compliment” or “complete”) serves 5000 clients in the surrounding districts, sponsoring clincs, vocational training, HIV prevention education, palliative care and capacity building [...]
