Regarding America

Gregory Boyle and the Power of Boundless Compassion

2011-10-31T22:03:10-07:00

By Daniel Hamon

Tattoos on the Heart, a touching yet heart-warming book written by Gregory Boyle, recounts the many instances in which Father Boyle has served and made a difference for the gang-involved youth in Los Angeles county. Father Boyle is a 2011 recipient of the Opus Prize, which is "given annually to recognize unsung heroes of any faith tradition, anywhere in the world, solving today’s most persistent social problems...winners combine an entrepreneurial spirit with an abiding faith to combat seemingly intractable global issues like poverty, illiteracy, hunger, disease, and injustice. Opus Prize winners demonstrate that change is possible, empowering and inspiring all of us."

Father Boyle founded Homeboy Industries in 1992 with the mission to assist at-risk and formerly gang involved youth to become positive and contributing members of society through job placement, training and education. In addition, Fr. Boyle provides support and encouragement for young people in need of opportunity and unconditional love. He writes:

Gangs are bastions of conditional love - one false move, and you find yourself outside. Slights are remembered, errors in judgment held against you forever. If a homie doesn't step up to the plate, perform the required duty, he can be relegated to "no good" status. This is a state from which it is hard to recover. Homeboy Industries seeks to be a community of unconditional love. Community will always trump gang any day. Derek Walcott writes, "Either I am a nobody or I am a nation." Our place at Homeboy is this touchstone of resilience. You discover your true self in this "nation." Homies who used to work at Homeboy always return on their days off or on their lunch break. A home said to me once, "I just came by to get my fix."

"Of what?" I ask him.

"Love," he says.

Everyone is just looking to be told that who he or she is is right and true and whole acceptable.

Please visit Homeboy Industries to learn more and to find out Fr. Boyle speaking schedule.

Photo: Molly Johnston www.GonzagaBulletin.com

GO Threads - Building Businesses To Care for Orphans

2011-09-03T14:16:46-07:00

By Daniel Hamon

Mike and Beth Fox founded the Global Orphan Project in 2003 to help care for the neediest orphans and vulnerable children in some of the poorest areas of the world, "children of last resort with no viable means of care."

GO Threads is their new sustainability initiative with sewing centers that create local jobs, produce school uniforms and help sustain orphan care, starting with four locations in Uganda and Haiti.

In a recent letter, Mike explains how Go Threads came about:

When I started traveling to meet with our local partners several years ago, one seemingly small thing became a thorn in my side. School uniforms. I’d see these places of abject poverty, with orphaned children, abandoned children, and just plain poor children in the community naked or in filthy rags, sitting in the dirt, and then another group of children decked out in brightly colored, sharp uniforms bounding off to school. Even in situations where schools were “free” (government or privately funded schools), I saw the dividing line.

That frustrated me. I saw what I thought was injustice. I wanted schools to do away with the school uniform requirement. Our local partners insisted that we stop demanding and start listening.

Schools – even overcrowded, underfunded government schools – and the bright outfits of its students bring lift. Dignity. Possibility. Amidst smothering hopelessness, slipping a sharp uniform on to a hurting child lifts that child’s countenance to want to learn. To those children, something as simple as a school uniform means, “I am somebody.”

We listened. We learned. And we started funding some school uniforms for our children in care. We quickly found this lift our partners spoke of proved to be very real. If you’ve traveled to visit our children around the world, you’ve seen it. We were particularly struck by one little girl in Kabale, Uganda. When she came into care, and felt secure enough to openly talk to her caregivers, one of our local leaders asked her to describe her feelings. She could have said anything. “I can’t believe I have a home.” “I can’t believe I have food to eat everyday.” “I can’t believe that I have a momma here who shows me love.” Anything. She said none of these. Here’s what she said: “I never thought I’d go to school looking so ‘smart’ like other children.”

Please visit GO Threads to learn more about this initiative, including their Team Challenge that just started on September 1st and will run through December 31st.

Gleanings for the Hungry

2010-08-21T10:04:09-07:00

By Daniel Hamon

Since 1982, volunteers have been coming to Gleanings for the Hungry in Dinuba, CA to play an active role in feeding the poor and needy of the world. Most of these volunteers, about 1,200 during the summer months, are high school students who pay $85 to spend a week working at a fruit line where peaches and nectarines are sorted, cut, dried and then loaded into trucks to be shipped to feed the world's hungry people.

Kim, a good friend of mine, just spent time there with her children. She says the work is hard but the sense of purpose and accomplishment is much greater - that's probably why there is a two-year wait to volunteer for this project.

The peaches and nectarines are donated by packers and, even though most of the fruit is in good condition, buyers will not accept it because it doesn't meet the size or other superficial requirements of supermarkets and other customers.

In addition to processing fruit, Gleanings for the Hungry also mixes vegetable soup and repackages bulk donations into smaller bundles for easier distribution by its ministries in needy nations. A local almond grower, for example, donates 10% of his harvest.

According to their July newsletter, 45,000 pounds of soup mix and dried fruit were recently distributed in Nicaragua, feeding more than 2,000 people.

Photo - RegardingAmerica.com

Scholarships for College - The Kalamazoo Promise

2010-08-14T17:38:57-07:00

By Daniel Hamon

In 2005, a small group of donors started The Kalamazoo Promise, a non-profit corporation that has the goal of providing "each Kalamazoo Public School graduate with the opportunity to attend post-secondary education with up to a 100% tuition scholarship."

The eligibility and requirements seem simple enough: students in the Kalamazoo Public Schools who have graduated and attended four years or more and who go to any public university or community college in the State of Michigan. Once enrolled in college, beneficiaries need to maintain a 2.0 GPA, a minimum of 12 credit hours and make continuing progress toward their degrees.

At a time when a college education is becoming the minimum requirement for entry into the job market, the anonymous donors of The Kalamazoo Promise will surely make a major impact on the lives and standards of living of many Kalamazoo, MI high-school graduates.

Photo - KalamazooPromise.com

The Americans Will Adopt Anyone

2010-01-18T10:39:59-08:00

By Daniel Hamon

"Doesn't anyone ever want to adopt an older child?" she asked one day as a Spanish agency rep loaded twin baby boys into his back seat. For these scenes were becoming unbearable, the older children feeling more unwanted with every glorious departure of a baby.
At the beginning, the older children had run to comb their hair and change their shirts when visitors came, hoping that a last-minute excellent impression would make a difference.
"No," said the agency rep. "People want babies. Sometimes toddlers, but mostly babies and, most of all, baby girls."

These are the words of Melissa Fay Greene as she tells the story of Haregewoin Teferra, a woman who worked tirelessly to save the children of Ethiopia.

In the adoption world, Haregewoin learned, even a three-year-old was an "older child," declined by most prospective parents as possibly too damaged or traumatized by early experiences.
"But won't someone adopt the older children?" Haregewoin sighed as a Canadian-agency person prepared to depart with a baby.
"Try the Americans."
"What? Really?"
"The Americans will adopt anyone."
"What does it mean?"
"There was a boy at the Mother Theresa Home who lost both his legs..."
"What?"
"I think he was herding his goats over train tracks and the train came and caught the boy. But the Americans are adopting him. They'll adopt school kids. They'll adopt kids with CP...
"Boys?"
"Yes, boys! They adopt boys, they adopt siblings."
"But big boys? School-age boys?"
"Yes, I'm telling you!"
Haregewoin was off like a shot. She sprinted to her house to start making phone calls to find the Americans.

Photo - ThereIsNoMeWithoutYou.com

Army Helicopter Pilot Becomes Angel to Iraqi Family

2009-12-30T23:01:27-08:00

By Daniel Hamon

Russell Hayes had served in the U.S. Army as a helicopter pilot during Vietnam. In 2007, he was recalled by the Army for service in Iraq. Hayes, age 55, thought there was no way he would be going back to the military. But his wife Carmen told him that perhaps God had a reason for him to be sent to Iraq, so Hayes went and ended up becoming an angel to the Salman family.

Abdul Salman, a wounded veteran of the Iran-Iraq war and father of six children, was a laborer in the "Green Zone" in Baghdad. His three youngest children, Seja, Ali and Bara'a were born with degenerative dwarfism. Hayes' youngest daughter is also a dwarf. From the moment Hayes landed in Iraq in 2008 and found out about Abdul Salman, he decided to do everything he could to help the Salman family.

Hayes worked hard to get visas for the children to come to the U.S. for treatment but the process took longer than a year. So Hayes stayed in Iraq longer than he was required to in order to help see this through. Through his dedication, personal financial support and the help he received from many U.S. military personnel and civilians, the children are receiving medical care and the Salman family is now in Idaho starting a new and better life.

Click here to find out more about this story and the Dwarf Advocacy Association.

Rooms for the Homeless

2009-12-26T09:38:00-08:00

By Daniel Hamon

According to the Columbus Dispatch, fifteen homeless people in Colorado Springs will be inside for Christmas, thanks to a mysterious donor who paid for their motel rooms. The donor, a woman that said her name was Linda Craft, paid in advance for four rooms insisting that they be used to provide shelter to some of the homeless campers that have been gathering near Interstate 25.

As reported by The Gazette, Maggie Spence, one of the beneficiaries "welcomed the weeklong shelter as an aid in finally kicking the pneumonia she’s been battling for weeks."

Linda Craft is another example of people in America quietly taking the initiative to help their neighbors in need.

America's Gift to Asia

2009-12-25T16:20:45-08:00

By Daniel Hamon

The Khaleej Times, one of the leading English language newspapers in the United Arab Emirates, recently published an article written by Kishore Mahbubani, dean of the School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, in which he attributes the rise of Asia to America's generosity:

The biggest strategic gift that America has made to the world is to spark the rise of Asia by generously sharing its wisdom and best practices with millions of Asians. It is dangerous to over-simplify history, but some crude facts are undeniable. If the American dream had not been discovered and created, and Europe had continued to dominate world history, Asian societies may not have awoken from centuries of slumber so quickly and smoothly. American generosity saved Asia.

Even now, each year about 90,000 young Indians and 80,000 young Chinese study in American universities. Is it any wonder that China and India are re-emerging as the world’s largest economies? And is it any wonder that the best practices they are using for their dynamic new corporations are taken from lessons provided by American universities? This is one reason why when businessmen from both sides of the Pacific meet they speak a common language: American.

One gift the world can celebrate on this Christmas day.

Photo - Atlas Shrugs

Comforting Trees

2009-12-24T14:19:21-08:00

By Daniel Hamon

For those who have lost their jobs, hope or faith, Sharon Girulat offers comfort in the form of a Christmas tree:

Two years ago she phoned the owner of a Frosty Farms lot and asked if she could have some leftover trees. They gave her about 50. She and her husband Rollin delivered them, along with decoration kits they made up, to some churches. Last year she called Frosty Farms again, as well as Johnson Brothers tree farm. She got another 50 trees and recruited a few colleagues to help make the deliveries.
This Christmas, 50 turned into 500. Peltzer Pines, which has several farms in Orange County, offered up 350 trees when Sharon came knocking. She put an ad on Craigslist, asking people to sing out if they had lost their job or their hope or their faith, and would find comfort in a Christmas tree.

There were a lot of touching responses including the following:

Sharon was surprised by the number of men who wrote to her saying they lost their job this year and for the first time can't afford Christmas. Many of them volunteered to help deliver trees to others in exchange for the one they were taking.

Photo - Leonard Ortiz

Making the Crooked Straight

2009-12-21T01:33:14-08:00

By Daniel Hamon

An upcoming documentary will focus on the work of Rick Hodes:

Born in Long Island, New York and educated at John Hopkins - Dr. Rick Hodes has dedicated his life to helping heal the sick and poor of Ethiopia over the past 20 years. Many of his patients are stricken with tuberculosis of the spine, a disease that creates massive humps on the backs of its victims. Eventually they’re forced into permanent forward-bending posture, which in turn prevents their lungs from working properly, and if left untreated leads to death.

Driven by his devotion to Orthodox Judaism and its belief that “He who saves one life, saves an entire world," Hodes provides these patients with hospital care - arranges for complex overseas surgeries - often paying for these out of his own pocket - and has, thus far, fostered seventeen children in order to provide them with not only proper medical care but a home and an education...Hodes believes the only way to change the world is to be the change.

I first learned about Dr. Rick Hodes from Melissa Fay Greene's There Is No Me Without You: One Woman's Odyssey to Rescue Her Country's Children:

[Rick Hodes is] a person who had disdained every opportunity to build a prosperous life far from a world of suffering and death. Healthy, lured by no particular financial or career incentives, he waded into the disaster areas of the world (Rwanda, Somalia, Albania, Sudan, Zaire, Tanzania, Lesotho, and Ethiopia), somehow feeling, "This is my fight."

He was a white American doctor. He was widely known, easily spotted. It was said that he would treat anyone who came to him, regardless of ability to pay, regardless of the hour of day or night.

He treated hundreds of patients pro bono as well, in paupers' hospitals and shantytowns across Addis Ababa. Between forty and fifty Ethiopian children and adults had been sent by Hodes to the United States or Israel for medical treatment unavailable in Ethiopia.

Photo - The Jewish Daily Forward