Monthly Archive

You are kindly invited to a prayer service (eucharist and adoration) on Sunday evening Dec 31, 2006 from 10 30 PM till 0 30 AM @ the Annunciation church (Saidet el Bishara) in Zokak el Balat - Beirut.

The intention is to pray for peace in the world, more specifically in Lebanon. The prayer shall be in Arabic but the Lord understands all languages so feel free to join at any time or to forward this invitation.

Below you see the icone of Christ’s birth (at the same church), in a new 3-dimensional way. The pastor of the church, who’s a pastor in the real meaning of the word, is also an architect and he has wonderful ideas for helping us grasp the theological meaning of the liturgical feasts. This Christmas icone will stay at church till Easter and already has Easter dimensions in it. Look at the tree branch on which the thorn crown hangs, there’s the olive branches pointing out to Jesus’ suffering at Gethsemani (bustan el Zeitoun). The path is not even, just as our lives are not smooth even pathways, BUT the Light (God) continues leading us…

Here is what Father Jean-Marie himself wrote:

Explication:

Le chemin de pierre représente un peu notre vie tumultueuse allant dans tous les sens avec pas mal de haut et de bas, mais avec un filet de LUMIERE qui n’abandonne pas le chemin ce qui nous rappelle la perpétuelle présence de Dieu dans notre vie.
Jésus s’est incarné dans le but de nous sauver c’est pourquoi l’on peut voir au sommet de la crèche la couronne d’épine qui est déjà là, ainsi qu’à gauche un des anges qui a les yeux fixés sur le petit jardin d’oliviers (19 plans d’oliviers qui seront dans le futur plantés dans le jardin de l’église)-(micro-Getsémani) et derrière les oliviers l’on peut voir la croix qui est déjà là.

The kids enrolled in drama classes wanted to perform the play they studied for their parents. They already played it for the senior citizens last week. Here you see some of them with their drama teacher Layal.

Today we have a scouts team animating for our kids. As the youngest ones went to the UNESCO on Dec 18, it’s the turn of the older ones. 35 kids assist and play games. Some made mosaics as you can see on the picture.

We planned to have a free meal from Burger King but as we applied too late, we did not receive anything but we arranged for a Lebanese meal: la7me bi 3ajine and Dunkin Donuts as desert.

Dear One and All,
On the occasion of Christmas I would like to extend my best wishes to you all, one by one. May the blessings of Christmas fill your hearts and homes.
A peaceful 2007!
A wonderful Adha feast.

On Tuesday night we had our yearly Christmas party for senior citizens. All came, muslim as well as christians and enjoyed the event. Children enrolled in the Art program performed a christmas medley and a theatre play.

Then the dinner and of course Santa Claus passed by and gave away gifts for the 70 people present.

After having spent a couple of hours together, it was time to go home…

You can not imagine the joy we all felt that evening despite the huge workload to prepare the event. I do believe the saying: it is in giving you’re receiving.

Though of course one also has to learn to receive…

Please take the time to read and listen to the story of Drama therapy in Beirut

Yesterday was the day of peace for children. A big event was organized by MAY’s group and 15 NGO’s were invited. The age group of children was 3 - 10. The aim: on the occasion of Christmas, New Year and the Adha feast children from underpriviliged environments are invited to spend a joyful afternoon. Entertainment was greatly performed by MINI-Studio. A success! Our children had so much fun, we had dressed them with a Santa hat and they danced and sang and received a present.

Two children of each NGO were asked to come on stage to be photographed with the organizers of the event. We had Elie and Yvonne (in front wearing a badge) going up.

We just finished a workshop about protection of Internally Displaced Persons in Lebanon and legal issues related to them. It was a very important event of 3 days. 30 participants were present, half of them from MOSA (Ministry of Social Affairs) and other NGO’s and organizations. We were with 3 trainers: Christophe Beau from IDMc (International Displacement Monitoring Center), Mateusz Tuniewicz from NRC (Norwegian Refugee Council) and myself. Even though the war stopped in August, till now we do have Displaced and follow up regarding their legal return and protection issues. Many NGO’ s are working hard and do a wonderful job. So putting them in contact with one another and broadening the coordination channels is not bad but also helps. I really enjoyed this workshop. The general atmosphere was great and as one of the participants put it: Inshallah we will never have to apply what we learned here…Meaning: hopefully there will not be another war.

Christophe the head trainer and myself, below one of the tables with participants working hard!

and the whole group of participants  with trainers

On Saturday night Dec 9, and in spite of the difficult political situation, many people attended the Christmas concert at AUB, Assembly Hall. Both AUB choir and IC choir gave a performance with a unique variety of Christmas carols. Proceeds go to “Ayadina Center for Fine and Performing Arts”, for our children.

Here below you see the International College Choir entering in procession:

Inside the Assembly Hall it is forbidden to take pictures unless one remains seated and takes shots from his place so…accordingly the quality of the following picture is not that good. Here you see both choirs performing together

After the happening people were offered hot chocolate and cake.

While trying to go to mass on Sunday we had to walk for quite a while because of the Beirut Marathon. This yearly Marathon is quite an event and had been postponed because of the death of Minister Pierre Gemayel on Nov 21. Last year Ayadina participated in the 10 km “RUN 4 FUN “.

They had as slogan this year: for the love of Lebanon and: run for life. Laughingly we now say in this situation: run for YOUR life.

It was during our walk that we were able to take a picture of the open sitting of some political parties in the middle of downtown. Life is not easy in here right now, people are afraid of going out. Many political leaders plead to stay calm and ask not provoke anybody. In all this turmoil, my sister and brother-in-law are visiting Lebanon. We were unable to visit downtown but visited some places outside Beirut.

Here below a picture from Byblos, the oldest town in the world.

Yesterday night all christians were invited at the St.  Elie church at Antelias in order to pray for Lebanon. This was a a-political meeting, so non-political. We just gathered with many to reflect and pray. A couple of persons gave a small testimony about how they love Lebanon and how they urge us to be united as Christians and to live together with all other denominations. The patriarch gave us his blessing and we sang. To me it was important to be there in order to see and know the unity in these times where clashes are so frequent between christians.

The picture below shows Ghassan Rahbani, a Lebanese christian artist and singer who sang a song “for those who are dying and died for their nation”, a universal song and he spoke very well urging all parties for unity.