Stop Trafficking! April 2015 Newsletter

Awareness  :

• Links Between a Damaged Environment and Modern Day Slavery
• Vulnerability of Women During Natural Disasters
• Migrating Patterns Predict Human Trafficking Patterns
• Mass Migrations in the Asian Pacific

Advocacy    :

• UNEP Recommendations for Climate Change Adaptation
• Human Trafficking: Healthcare Guidebook
• Protocol to Help Trafficked Victims in Hospital Settings

Action         :

• 'Fighting Slavery' A new book published in April 2015 highlights the role that faith is playing in combatting human trafficking.
• April 18th Conference: "Slavery No More: Breaking the Supply Chains of Human Slavery" at Manhattan College in Riverdale, NY

Click here for April's Stop Trafficking! Newsletter

A Cluny Vocation Story: Everything is Grace

Sister Regina Brunelle, SJC

 In the 1950’s not many young women dreamed of going to France to enter a religious congregation. My father certainly didn't think it was a good idea! But having read the life of Blessed Anne Marie Javouhey, nothing else would do but for me to throw in my lot with the women who were still carrying out her mission more than a century after her.What was it about her charism that beckoned me? She was a missionary and I had felt that call since I was very young. Moreover, her sisters served in a variety of ways on every continent. That diversity also drew me. Her strong, straightforward personality lured me even more. But it was her spirituality ... her total commitment to a contemplative discernment of seeking God’s will and the determination with which she met every difficulty that really attracted me because I found the contemplative life appealing, too. In my youthful opinion, if ever there lived a contemplative in action, it was certainly she!

But Dad was adamant, and I finally decided I’d better just go somewhere on the North American continent. I opted for the community that had educated me; they had missions in India and maybe I’d be sent there. Lo and behold! All sorts of obstacles suddenly cropped up, making an imminent departure unfeasible. I withdrew my application.

Read on about how Sister Regina fulfilled her dream to enter a religious congregation:

Click here to read Sr. Regina's full story

Easter Sunday

Rejoice and Be Glad

Alleluia!

Happy  Easter

Palm Sunday of The Lord's Passion

Imagine This!

Use the power of your imagination to pray with this scene of Jesus’ Entry Into Jerusalem.  Walk along beside Jesus. 

Gaze at the crowd surrounding you and welcoming Jesus. 

Savor the experience of being with Jesus at this moment on his journey to Jerusalem.  Return often to the scene throughout the beginning of Holy Week.

    

Gospel Scene                                                           Mark 11: 1-10

So they brought the colt to Jesus and put their cloaks over it. 

And he sat on it.  Many people spread their cloaks on the road, and others spread leafy branches that they had cut from the fields. 

Those preceding him as well as those following kept crying out: “Hosanna! 

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! 

Hosanna in the highest!”

Encountering Jesus        What do you See?  Hear?  Touch?

                                                                         Where are you / Who are you in the crowd?

Pray the mantra                 Praise to you, Lord, Jesus Christ… Hosanna!

Fifth Sunday of Lent

“Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies,

it remains just a grain of wheat;

 but if it dies,

it produces much fruit.”

    

As you take a stroll through the fields of your life during this fifth week of lent, take stock of your Lenten practices of prayer, fasting and goods works.  God molds the grains of these actions to produce a rich harvest and bring salvation to the world.  Listen to the words of Jesus:

“Whoever serves me must follow me,

and where I am, there also will my servant be. 

    

John 12:20-33

    

Practice:       Letting go of myself to reveal God’s Presence in the world.

Prayer:          Create a clean heart in me, O God.                  - Psalm 51