(Grandchild Sean on his way home to Portland)

This is a photo of our grandson Sean Carlson. His parents Matthew and Carrie and his twin brother Liam visited us for five weeks and headed home to Portland last Friday. Barbara, now known as Mimi B and I fell in love the instant we saw the boys. They were 3 months old and ready to be liberated from their snug car chairs after the long drive from Ashland.

Here is the whole family Left to Right: Sean, Carrie, Matthew, and Liam. They stayed with us and we cooked for them and held the boys while Carrie got a nap. We had no idea caring for twins is so much harder than caring for a single baby and we went to bed exhausted just about every night. But the love flowed and we are so happy to welcome these little bambinos into our lives.

I took great delight in making the boys laugh and I rolled around with them on the pillows and carpet. I looked into their bright eyes and acted the fool of course... Isn't that what grandpas do?

But I was troubled by the thought that there are so many children in the world who are not enjoying peace... so many on the road with parents who have lost it all. So many from so many different countries.

Ibrahim a child refugee from Syria, no less beautiful than our twins. And I thought what makes people so desperate they'll leave their homes. I found this quote:

“No one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land.”

- Warsan Shire

think about that. That thought has bothered me for 2 days.

“No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark.”

(Rohinga driven from Burma to Bangladesh)

“Refugees are mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, children, with the same hopes and ambitions as us—except that a twist of fate has bound their lives to a global refugee crisis on an unprecedented scale.” - Khaled Hosseini

And then I remember this little girl from El Salvador. She was so happy with the ball we brought as a gift to her school. Such a simple thing. We need to share in whatever way we can.

“It is the obligation of every person born in a safer room to open the door when someone in danger knocks.”

“Faced with the tragedy of tens of thousands of refugees who flee death from war and hunger, and who have begun a journey moved by hope for survival, the Gospel calls us to be “neighbors” of the smallest and the abandoned and to give them concrete hope. It’s not enough to say, “Take heart. Be patient”.... Christian hope has a fighting spirit, with the tenacity of one who goes toward a sure goal.

Therefore I make an appeal to parishes, religious communities, monasteries and shrines throughout Europe, that they express the Gospel in a concrete way and host a refugee family.”

Our response from Emmaus has been so good. We have always risen to the challenge of giving locally and globally. Let's keep it up.

ANNOUNCEMENT #1

Board Meeting Today at 1:30 - 3:00

Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/5193158573

Meeting ID: 519 315 8573

Passcode: 1234

ANNOUNCEMENT #2

Register for our Women Erased Series

https://www.futurechurch.org/women-erased-series

Our next installment Women Erased: Adam has a Womb is this Tuesday, November 17th at 8pm Eastern Time. Join us for a special screening of the delightful and eye-opening animated short film (m)adam: Adam's Rib Reframed and a no-holds-barred discussion with filmmaker, Catholic Chaplain Lizzie Berne DeGear, PhD. (m)adam just won Best Religious Film at the Viva International Film Festival; and this will be Lizzie's first in-depth discussion of the film -- and the scholarship behind it -- with a Catholic audience.

While we will be watcing this short film together on Tuesday night, we do encourage you to preview it over the next few days. You can view the film here.

Lizzie Berne DeGear, PhD is a chaplain, writer, Bible scholar and Catholic feminist. Her biblical scholarship combines depth psychology and theology and has appeared in Religious Education and the UTS Quarterly Review, as well as in her book For She Has Heard.

5:00 PM PACIFIC TIME TODAY Tuesday November 17, 2020

Link to join:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84385245576?pwd=cmtWVVVtRXkzTnJOOVRobHBSRGVQUT09

Or join by entering information directly into Zoom: Meeting ID: 843 8524 5576 Passcode: 211677