Thursday, January 3, 2008

Tenth Day of Christmas: Latin American reflection and appeal

What, you gave and your cat, dog, or guppy did not? Look for their secret stash of cash, and run, don't walk, to the post office or to PayPal, and send those spare pennies to the OCICBW... Community Christmas Appeal for the parish of Cristo Rei in Cidade de Deus, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil!

That's right, I just realized I had given, but Miss Maya Pavlova had not. Mea culpa. We want Total Household Giving here!

We have passed the $7000 mark and are headed toward $8000. Get those cats to cough up!

Project and payment details here.

And now for your daily reflection. Today again, Ivone Gebara, from the early 1990s interview she gave Mev Puleo. This interview is in the same book (The Struggle Is One) from which I quoted Pedro Casaldáliga and Maria Miguel.

I have the impression that most people from the rich or middle-classes feel sorry for the poor, but this sorry doesn't go very far. Ultimately, people want to save their own skin and have their place in the sun.

I'm convinced of the terribly urgent necessity for the rich and middle-class to open up to a more human dimension of their own riches, which, most times, are made from the direct or indirect exploitation of the poor. To discover the human meaning of wealth is to discover a happiness, a well-being, a meaning for that which is the fruit of human hands, that every person has a right to.

The wealth of the rich is inhuman because it rests on the death of others. So we need a movement of collective consciousness to change the rules of the economic game, the political game, the ideological game. If the rich keep guarding their own interests, then, without a doubt, they'll be the first ones responsible for the destruction of human life and all life on the face of the earth.

... I think a revolution is possible. I'm not talking about taking up arms, but the revolution of people who are beginning to build from little things, obeying the values deep within themselves that will save humanity and the earth.

*********- Ivone Gebara

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