don't buy me a birthday present...

...buy a Christmas present for these children instead.

Here's why (and if you can't be bothered to read it all, details of how to give are at the end of the post)

These kids live in the slum in Chennai, where I visited in January. The people who live in the slum are Dalits, lovely people who, because of the Hindu caste system, are considered to be at the "bottom of the pile." They have very little, struggle to find good jobs and are living in 2mx2m huts with families of up to 10 people along the banks of a river which acts as the city's main sewer. Every year, monsoon season causes the river to flood, filling the houses with filthy water and waste. Alcoholism is extremely common, and it's not difficult to understand why. Life is hard.

Grassroots is working with SKM - the church in the community, who are supporting the people there in many ways, including an after-school club which is attended by 100+ children every day, for homework support, teaching, games and sometimes food.

Because the caste system is a Hindu construct, families who convert to Christianity are seen by the government as not being Dalits any more. This means that they lose their government funded rice subsidies. Unfortunately, other systems do not see things this way and it doesn't necessarily become any easier to find work or move out of the slum. The families are left with no rice subsidy but no extra income.

In the Indian culture, important festivals are celebrated by everyone wearing bright new clothes. Children's clothing in India is extremely expensive, costing approximately 3 times the average salary of a person living in the slum. Having special new clothes really is a treat for these children. Financially, buying festival clothing for the children of Christian families is often impossible, which in turn means that the rest of the community are led to believe that Christmas isn't so important, because if it was, the children would be wearing celebration clothes.

Every year, SKM buys a Christmas present for each of the 100 children in the after school club. The children love their new outfits and take extra care of them, whilst also grabbing hold of any opportunity to wear them. It's part of the community enjoying celebrating Christmas together, giving Christians an opportunity to demonstrate their faith, and inviting others to come and find out.

Last year we raised over £300 for HIV testing in Tanzania for my birthday. It was great fun, and actually quite liberating not getting any presents (not that I'm not grateful for anything you might have given me in the past, obviously!) so I'm going to do it again. Who knows, maybe it'll become an annual thing. This year, the toddler group at our church have raised £400 for the children in India. Are we going to be beaten by a bunch of 2 year olds...?

To give you some idea, it costs around £10 for an outfit for one child. Any money left over will be used to support other ministries in the slum.

So, if you want to join me in celebrating my birthday, here's how. Click on this link. It'll take you to a page on the Grassroots website where you can either donate by credit card or find information on how to send money by post. Make sure you include a note with my name so that they know where to put it.

Donate to Grassroots

orison feedback

The kit is all back in its boxes, the team are tired but happy (well, I am - and I hope the rest are too!) and the pupils have left school in the distant past and are concentrating on half term.

We spent last week running an Orison prayer space at Salesian High School in Chertsey. Here are just some of the comments and stories from the week.

Thanks miss, it's really helped me. I was struggling with my faith but you've shown me that I don't have to be in a church to pray

When asked what had made her smile so much, a girl said "I've just been forgiven. By God. And I forgave someone else too.

One of our newer resources invited pupils to write words which others use to describe them in a sand tray. They could then choose not to believe those words by wiping them away with their hand and writing more positive alternatives instead. Conversations over this resource included -
- an 11 year old girl who said people called her ugly. She was genuinely one of the most beautiful girls in her class. Even when encouraged by the team member to choose "beautiful" as her alternative word, she could only bring herself to accept that other people might think she was OK
- a 12 year old boy wiping away tears as he tried to think of alternatives to the word he originally wrote - "misunderstood"
- a girl who wrote "unloved" in the sand turning to the next resource in the zone and writing her name on a large hand to represent being known and loved by God

The bubble tube was covered daily with heartfelt and deep prayers from students worried about exams, getting into trouble, making right decisions, ill parents, family struggles, friends in need...

Positive feedback from parents at an (unrelated) open evening the school had organised to hear parents' views on various aspects of the school. The prayer space was discussed and praised in the "Spirituality of the School" section with parents of pupils who hadn't yet visited demanding to know why their children hadn't been!

Paper on the floor filled daily with all manner of questions for God.
"Are you real?"
"Why does religion cause so much hate and argument?"
"Do you love me?"
"When will my parents stop arguing?"
"Why do people we love have to die?"
"Why is there suffering?"

"People in this world need to stop worrying about money and realise that we are all family. Our family needs help"
Prayer written for slum children in Chennai in response to information and images displayed about their situation.

This is just a small sample. There'd be no way to communicate all of what happened in the prayer room in one blog. Even those of us who were there have only the smallest of idea of what was actually going on. We presented a resource to around 800 children in 25 classes over 5 days, managing deep conversations with a few of them, general explanation and facilitation for many of them, and minimal crowd control for the few who still struggled to take it seriously. God is faithful, loving and merciful and met in ways that only He can know with so many of the pupils who experienced the space.

catching up

I'm well aware that I haven't blogged for months. And that it's almost certainly true that nobody reads this so that doesn't matter much anyway. In fact, there's been loads I could have blogged about in that time. I've written so many posts (or part-posts) and then deleted them. Somehow they just didn't feel right. Hence the silence.

I should blog that I left my job at St James Clerkenwell and now work 4 days a week running breathe (a spirituality resource for 16-19 year olds) and 1 day a week on Orison (creative prayer spaces in schools) and that it's great.

I should blog that Orison spent 3 weeks at Soul Survivor hosting a prayer space in the Toolshed and having conversations with hundreds of people just bursting with potential for where prayer spaces could happen across the UK (and beyond) in the next year or so.

I should blog that we've moved house twice since May. And that our new flat is lovely, albeit full of boxes of stuff all piled in the wrong places at the moment. Or that my new job (the breathe one) involves working in an office back at LCET which is a fab schoolswork organisation in Luton where I did my year out, and that that means I work with an amazing team of awesome people who never cease to amaze, inspire and encourage me.

I should blog about how leaving St James Clerkenwell was really quite hard, but all part of God's plan for me and for them so the right thing to do (and how that was confirmed by God speaking to me through some amazing people and, among other things, a Mike & the Mechanics song!).

I even missed blogging our 7th wedding anniversary, and another chance to blog about how I'm married to the most fantastic husband ever. I think we've laughed together more this year than ever before. And whilst we're on the subject of husband, I could have blogged that he had his dreads cut off and has returned to his short hair which was a surprise... but a good one!

I could blog about 2 weekends away with some lovely lovely friends. Or numerous times spent with our super-cute goddaughter and her parents.

I could blog about how we've rejoined a church we used to be part of a few years ago and how lovely it is to be back in the family again. And also about how we're exploring other ways of being church and what all that means.

See? So much I could have blogged about. Maybe it would have been boring? Maybe it's good that I didn't? I don't know. It's certainly been an unbelievably amazing few months round here. I just couldn't find the words to blog it. Sorry.

orison online

I've blogged a bit about Orison already but the exciting news this week is that the website and video are now online.

You can watch the video (and show it to your teacher, headteacher, youth worker, church leader, gran etc) here:

Orison from Stuart Boreham on Vimeo.

and then head on over to the website at:
www.orisonschools.org.uk
to find out more about what we do, why we do it and how you could do it in your school, college, church, back garden etc...

freedom

Aung San Suu Kyi:
- democratically elected leader of Burma
- held under house arrest for over 13 years by the military dictatorship, for campaigning for human rights and democracy in her country
- currently on trial charged with breaking the terms of her house arrest, after an American man swam across the lake and refused to leave. She is being held in Insein prison, which is well known for it's abuse of prisoners, bad conditions and use of torture

Aung San Suu Kyi is 64 today. In her words: "Please use your liberty to promote ours"

The struggle for democracy and human rights in Burma is a struggle for life and dignity. It is a struggle that encompasses our political, social and economic aspirations.
Aung San Suu Kyi