REACH OUT AND TOUCH A WOMAN IN NEED

I support two women in regions that are currently in hellish lives or have lived through hellish lives. One of my sisters is in Iraq. And the other is in Rwanda. I do this through the non-profit organization "Women for Women". Women only can be in the program for one year so that more women can be helped. This is the third sister I have sponsored in Rwanda. And last year I was asked to take a woman as my sister in Iraq. I write to my sisters in Rwanda, but I am not allowed to in Iraq because the women there are too afraid for their lives. The surge hasn't helped them.

I ask you to watch the video of a segment that was on "60 Minutes" tonight. It is about the hell that the women live with continually in the Democratic Republic of the Congo since the 1994 Rwandan genocide, that we in the USA knew about during the Clinton Presidency, but minced words over the definition of "genocide" versus the "acts of genocide". One definition meant we would have been obligated to act and the other allowed us to do nothing, as one million plus Tutsis were hacked to death by Hutus with ten cent Chinese machetes and garden tools. The Hutus left Rwanda and now are continuing their behavior in the DR Congo. It is now 2008. That is 14 years of this. And we are complicit in the results. We were silent in 1994 and it goes on today.

Every day in the Congo women are being traumatized; their suffering used as weapons of war.

Anderson Cooper and 60 Minutes visited the organization "Women for Women" operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo and met the women they serve there. The 60 Minutes piece, “War Against Women”, showed the unspeakable violence these brave women face every day as well as the hope for the future that the Women for Women International program brings.

Check out the website, www.womenforwomen.org/congo, for more information and continued updates on the show, to make a donation, or to learn more about the women of the DR Congo.

Zainab Salbi is the Women for Women International CEO and Founder

60 Minutes

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Dedicated to the Women in DR of Congo
Thanks to Mimi

“……AND YOU STILL HAVE PASSION. THAT MATTERS MORE."

At

http://amazinggracemovie.com/

download "The Story of Amazing Grace"

I did. I enjoyed it very much.

This is a painting that I did using a photograph from the Oprah website of when she went to
South Africa

for the Christmas Kindness show. It is a water color and I won Honorable Mention at a juried art show with the Portsmouth Arts Guild in Portsmouth, Rhode Island.

Lines from the movie, Amazing Grace:

“……and you still have passion. That matters more.” Barbara to William Wilberforce

“Great men are spoken about when it’s to do with violence, such as Napoleon and return to pomp. Rarely do they speak of men of peace. William Wilberforce, however, will return to his family with head on pillow, knowing the slave trade is no more – making a better world.….” Thomas Clarkson

I love this movie, AMAZING GRACE, so-o much. The cast, the story, the acting, the music. I majored in music because of what it does to my soul. I have my B.S. and M.M. in music. And it is not the degrees that I have, but the power of music that reaches in and takes a hold of me like nothing else. I remember as a young person sitting in church and sometimes I didn’t listen to the sermon, but the songs were what grabbed a hold of my spirit and moved me. And it’s no different today. I love, love, love music. I am the music and the music is me. I know that I am a passionate person. More than others. People let me know this continually by their reaction to my passionate way of emoting and being. Some may not feel . . . I don’t know, maybe, comfortable around such passion – but others seem to be drawn to it. I can’t be any other way.

I love who I am and my passionate way of living my life is a huge part of that. I am speaking at the Unitarian Universalist Channing Memorial Church March 18 and yesterday I met with the two who are in charge of planning the entire service for two hours after a very interesting all music church service. This is a Unitarian Church so the music included songs such as Embraceable You, Imagine, Standing in the Need of Prayer, Over the Rainbow, Take Five, Catch a Falling Star, Nine Ma Tov and a trumpet solo playing Taps! Anyway, I will be the guest speaker on the 18th of March and the topic is Darfur and the Genocide. My passion was seemingly too much for one of the participants, however I have witnessed her in an altered state of excitement at one time, so I’m not sure what it all meant that she didn’t welcome my spirit of joy. I am so happy in my life and it shows. When I left I heard myself softly say to myself, “Well, I don’t care if she doesn’t like my happiness, I like my happiness.” I am doing what I feel destined to do in speaking out against the genocide and when aligned with the universe, I think the happiness just comes from the well of just-being-all-right-with-LIFE.

I found this wonderful Youtube video tonight. I have been looking since I saw AMAZING GRACE last Friday, February 23, opening day of the movie here in the United States for a special video of this song. See if you like this.

The photos of Ioan Gruffudd above are from

http://lost-for-jack.livejournal.com/179922.html

If you want to read some very interesting reviews or interviews regarding this film, AMAZING GRACE and Ioan Gruffudd check out this link:

http://s177430995.onlinehome.us/amazing_grace/newsite/community/viewtopic.php?t=21

Here is the link to My Topic, “Did you see AMAZING GRACE opening day? Did it move you?” at the Amazing Grace movie website:

http://www.amazinggracemovie.com/community/viewtopic.php?t=62

<:<:<:<: "The strong can not expect the weak to placate >:>:>:>:
them and call it healing."
........Sandra Hammel, aka ilovemylife


Don’t let weeds grow around your dreams.
........From H. Jackson Brown, Jr.’s
........Life’s Little Instructon Book. Volume 2

<:<:<:<: “We are All the Keepers of Justice. <:<:<:<:
OR not.”
........Sandra Hammel, aka ilovemylife

peacepeacepeacepeacepeacepeacepeacepeacewillnotworkif
justonemanaliveisunjustignoranthungrycrazyashamedJosephPintauro
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"The Glory of God is Man Fully Alive." St. Irenaeus of Lyons
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"We think of religious activity as directed toward God - instead of man.

We believe in someone divine rather than in ourselves.

Maybe we have turned religion inside-out." Please Touch Edwin M. McMahon & Peter A. Campbell

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