Saturday, Jan 16, 2010 @ 11:21am
"If we don't help them the world will lose a whole nation."
- Marcia Spratt, HTFH Sponsorship Coordinator
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Saturday, Jan 16, 2010 @ 1:10pm (Written to Hopper)
So far, all discernment is towards me going to Haiti and everything needed to be arranged prior to committing to HTFH are now taken care of and approved.. I just got off the phone with Fr. Beaune and I have his blessing... Also, both Greg here at Don Bosco Home and my wife Elizabeth give me their blessing and support as well... Elizabeth has concerns if it was to be for months on end, but for a period of several weeks, it is feasible and she is okay with it...
Now, I just need to communicate with Steve McDougall who is the coordinator of Hearts Together for Haiti... I have left a message on his phone and am awaiting a return call... One of the most important questions is how do I get down and there and back? Well, if you watch the video I posted on the thread on the forum, HTFH have fundraisers specifically for this, to raise money to bring volunteers there... Their next fundraiser is mid February just before we would leave for Haiti...
Please continue with prayers, I'm very serious about this, and it's looking more and more like I am un fact going!! Which confirms something to me... The very moment I first heard of this devastating earthquake, and before we even had an inkling of it's magnitude, I had an extremely strong sense that this earthquake had just changed my life forever.. I had no idea why that feeling even came to be and it made absolutely no sense in the moment.. Today, it makes complete sense...
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Saturday, January 16, 2010 8:00pm
Earlier today I spoke with Fr. Beaune and he has given me his blessing to go to Haiti for a period of 8 to 10 days sometime in February with the organization Heart's Together For Haiti which as of right now sounds like it will be to help re-build a medical clinic in Port-Au- Prince .. I have also been in contact today with the organization Hearts Together for Haiti and spoke with Steve McDougall on the phone for about 45 minutes.. still many details need to be clarified and will be as information continues to come in.. As you can imagine, it is extremely chaotic in Haiti right now so it is difficult even for the coordinators to get a handle on how to organize everything for this pending trip.. However, as it now stands it looks very much as though I am indeed going to Haiti along with them to assist in any way they can utilize me.. Please keep us in your prayers, and especially, please keep Haiti in your prayers..
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Monday, Jan 18, 2010 @ 12:40pm
I do not know if I will have access to the internet, however, of course you know that if I do, I will be keeping everyone informed as I am able to.... I will be keeping a journal and writing daily, one I've already began as of a few days ago...
Details are very sketchy right now as Hearts Together For Haiti are in the very early stages still of planning and organizing this trip so I am not able to go into any specific details just yet.. But again, as information comes in I will keep everyone up to date and informed..
A portion of the fund raising will be used to for expenses to get me to Haiti with this wonderful team. However, hopefully generosity and charity will not and should not stop there. When we head to Haiti we will be bringing a very large shipment of goods with us, food, clothing, especially medicine, and so that in itself has costs... Even in a time like this there are still cost's when you go to do something... In a perfect world for instance, it would be nice if the airlines flew aid workers down there for free or if hotels put volunteers up for the night free of charge, however, also in a state of emergency often anything goes, and so again, there are still cost's in order to get the help needed to the people in most need there...
Just a few years ago on Good Friday during the Stations of the Cross as he made his way along the Way of the Cross Pope Benedict directly addressed the unavoidable issue of world poverty spoke the following words while meditating at the 9th Station.. These words I have never forgot, and they have so much to do with why I feel called to go to Haiti...
"Where is Jesus in agony in our own time?
In the division of our world into belts of prosperity
and belts of poverty ... this is Christ’s agony today.
Our world is made of two rooms:
in one room, things go to waste,
in the other, people are wasting away;
in one room, people die from surfeit,
in the other, they die from indigence;
in one room, they are concerned about obesity,
in the other, they are begging for charity.
Why don’t we open a door?
Who don’t we sit at one table?
Why don’t we realize that the poor
can help the rich?
Why? Why? Why are we so blind?
Pope Benedict XVI during Meditation at the 9th Station along the Way of the Cross, Lent 2006
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Wednesday January 19, 2010 @ 8:00am
I feel apprehensive about what I will see when I arrive in Haiti next month. As I see the images on the news coming in of the devastation my heart just goes out for these poor souls trying to survive. This morning there is another earthquake, a 6.1 further shaking the little bit of buildings still left standing, further hampering rescue and relief efforts, and further shaking the faith of the people. Please Lord, have mercy on your precious children. Give us hope Lord... Grant us the resolve to maintain faith...
We struggle to wrap our little minds around what has happened. It's unfathomable. Never in our life time has the world witnessed such a catastrophe centered in one specific location.. Not since Hiroshima and Nagasaki.. The 2004 Asian Tsunami left a quarter million dead in about 14 different countries spread out along the entire coast of the Indian Ocean. But this.... this horrible undoing of peoples lives is all centered on one island and in one nation, and in one city.. No official death toll yet. It's too early to tell.. There is just too much chaos and devastation to even try to keep proper records of those missing. The impact center of this horrific tragedy was home to nearly 3 million people. If only 1 in 10 died as a result of Tuesday's earthquake that would put the death toll at over 300,000... Still, we just don't know...
Those who survived are in dire need of the worlds help.. Our help!! Who can they turn to? Who can help them? We can! I can!
Lord, make me a channel of your peace,
Where there is hatred let me bring your love,
Where there is injury your pardon Lord,
And where there's doubt true faith in you.
Lord, make me a channel of your peace,
Where there's despair in life, let me bring hope,
Where there is darkness, only light,
And where there's sadness, ever joy.
O Master grant that I may never seek,
So much to be consoled as to console,
To be understood as to understand,
To be loved as to love with all my soul.
Lord, make me a channel of your peace,
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
In giving to all men that we receive
And in dying that we are born to eternal life.
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Thursday, January 21, 2010 1:00pm
I just returned from the clinic a little while ago as I needed to start a series of twinrix shots, today being the first of three.. I must be pretty darn serious about this because I am terrified, actually petrified of shots! lol.. But Our Lady comforted and walked me through it..
I must admit, I found it rather unsettling how backwards our society can really be sometimes... Not that I'm complaining about having to pay for this shot.. I understand that and to me it's well worth it! But to learn that if I was getting this shot because I lived an active gay lifestyle or was a drug addict the shot would be free of charge, but because I'm getting it to go help people in need there is a fee.. I don't know.. just something doesn't seem right with this picture.. Anyways, the main thing is that I've started the series of shots to prepare to go to Haiti late next month..
I am devoting so much of my prayers to these poor children of God, our dear brothers and sisters in Christ who are suffering so much down in Haiti right now, and especially since yesterday morning, the greatest effort of these prayers are for God's mercy to fall upon this poor country.. My heart just aches for them.. We have it so easy here! So many of us anyways.. I've encountered or learned about so many in conversations recently of situations where almost entire families have been killed, and the surviving loved ones, having to cope with the death of their children, their parents, their siblings, cousins, neighbors, and best friends, also have to try and survive from the point of utter tragedy onward..
It's so difficult to wrap our minds around it.. No official death toll because as quickly as bodies are recovered, they are dumped into a big hole in the ground unidentified... It's completely unfathomable!
Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, Have mercy on us poor sinners...
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Friday, January 22, 2010 @ 9:30am
HTFH has called for a special "meet & greet" session of all volunteers to meet this Sunday evening at 6:30pm at a local Church. From there, it is our hopes that as information coming in from Haiti continues, plans being made to travel to Haiti late next month become more clear..
