When we open newspapers or watch the news on television it is easy to feel overwhelmed and discouraged by the amount of negative news that is the media’s focus.
And yet, throughout the world, there are many “points of light” – people and organizations who labour hard and tirelessly to make this world one that is brighter, more equitable, and responsive to the needs of the most vulnerable among us. These are the types of inspiring stories this new section will include – they can’t help but bless!
Israeli government plans last year for a mass deportation of African asylum-seekers created a public outcry and remain on hold. But migrant families and their children live in a painful state of uncertainty. Yet in an impoverished neighborhood in Tel Aviv is a school dedicated to helping migrant children thrive educationally and emotionally, teaching students…
A Blessing for Bees (Excerpts) Many of us are aware that bees are facing possibly the most critical period of their existence on earth. Some years ago, in one region in China, the excessive use of pesticides had totally eliminated the bees and trees were pollinated by hand. Yet more than 80% of plants –…
“The Infinite is the source of joy!” (Chandogya Upanishad 7.23) There is a mighty rushing river of deep Joy at the center of all life. Oh yes, there is also a roller-coaster ride of pleasure and pain at the surface of human experience. Yet transcending this is a Joy that is the very effervescence of…
Nora Belahcen Fitzgerald born In Morocco of American parents, founded the Amal for the Culinary Arts association in Marrakesh, Morocco, in 2012 as an NGO for give unemployed women hands-on experience at the association’s own restaurant, before finding them a job through its network of partners. Today, Amal (Arabic for “hope”) is so successful it doesn’t have…
Floral Angels, a charity re-purposing flower bouquets is helping to spread joy to others It was only when she read the letter from the women’s refuge that Frances Hunter fully realised the difference she and Floral Angels were making. “We had made up some posies and taken them to the refuge,” she remembers. “The letter…
Below is an excerpt from a recent feature in “Grateful Changemakers” of Gratefulness.org. We hope this short summary will encourage you to click on the link and read the entire inspiring story and, who knows, perhaps get involved. https://gratefulness.org/grateful-news/grateful-changemakers-musicians-for-world-harmony/ “Music is a great force for healing – something we all need in our lives…We are…
How many times do you give thanks in your life? Being grateful is not only a nice gesture, it actually creates positive changes in the neurological structure of your brain. This powerful practice can have a lasting stimulation of the feelings of joy and motivation and increase your capacity to express gratitude. Numerous studies have…
“I bless children in foster care, that the challenges of their past weigh not unduly on their future. I bless the hosting families that they may welcome their foster child with gentleness, deep compassion and caring and an understanding of their special needs.” Pierre Pradervand, from https://pierrepradervand.com/365-blessings-to-heal-myself-and-the-world/ On any given day, there are nearly 437,500…
from The Independent – May 10, 2018 “…we bless the human race in its ability to exercise wise stewardship in all areas of the environment.” Excerpt from https://pierrepradervand.com/365-blessings-to-heal-myself-and-the-world/ Costa Rica’s new president has announced a plan to ban fossil fuels and become the first fully decarbonized country in the world. Carlos Alvarado, a 38-year-old former…
March 8, 2018, CNN News Norway’s prison system is designed with three core values in mind: normality, humanity and rehabilitation. The point of incarceration in Norway, they say, is to make inmates “better neighbors” once they are released – and they take that mission very seriously. In the US, prison is generally seen as punishment…
“I bless the scientists and others working to cleanse the oceans, lakes and rivers in their creativity that they may devise ever more efficient ways of protecting this God-given resource.” Pierre Pradervand, from 365 Blessings to Heal Myself and the World Now available from the publisher, o-books.com in bookstores and other outlets. Elizabeth Macpherson, Erin O’donnell…
March 21, 2014, The Telegraph (One of the UK’s leading newspapers) https://www.telegraph.co.uk/sponsored/culture/noah-movie/10706053/kyle-maynard… Kyle Maynard, 27, was born with a rare condition called congenital amputation that left him without the lower parts of his arms or legs. It’s a disability that would, understandably, all but end most people’s potential for a normal life. Yet for the determined Atlanta…
Voix Libres (Free Voices) was founded in 1993 by Marianne Sebastien, who is primarily a singer and who has integrated song into her basic development approach with amazing success. Voix Libres’s primary goal was to offer alternatives to child labor in the mines, fields, garbage dumps and streets of Bolivia. The association is active all over…
“The non-dual spirituality of today is necessarily service-oriented. If my neighbor is myself, I cannot just state this in front of my private altar and let it stay there. If spirituality is worth its salt, it will be concerned with some form of active service to the world. Together, we will heal this world or destroy…
Frustrated with the peace process, more Arab-Israeli women are joining the ranks of Women Wage Peace, rejecting pressure not to ‘normalize’ relations with Israeli Jews. Says member Ghadir Hani, “I was born in Akko, a mixed city, and I grew up on the values of accepting others,” she says. “We are all human beings. We…
“If you educate a man, you educate an individual. But if you educate a woman, you educate a nation.” African proverb After Lily Yoseph returned to Kofele, her Ethiopian hometown, she was struck by the poverty in the village, as well as the fact that often girls don’t have the opportunity to attend school. So…
By Hand-Painting Flowers On Its Houses “Life and its faculties are not measured by calendars …. Each succeeding year unfolds wisdom, beauty, and holiness.” MBE Anežka (Agnes) Kašpárková, a resident of Louka, a village in the Czech Republic and a former agricultural worker, picked up the hobby from other local women who had been doing…
For years, Italian coffee giant illy has earned the reputation of a company that prioritizes people over profits. And while it sources its coffee from 25 countries around the globe, Columbia is the place where that philosophy is making a real difference. Ask Fernando, an ex-commander of the FARC paramilitary revolutionary movement that spent 50…
On Tilos, where fewer than 500 people live (and they’re outnumbered by goats 45 to 1), locals have given shelter, jobs, and education to twelve families – and want them to stay. They are the forgotten people – more than 60,000 refugees who have been languishing in camps in Greece after their dreams of finding…
Posted by Neeti S W on Jul 10, 2017 We thought we would post this today, Global Oneness Day 2017, to illustrate how compassion for and acceptance of others can have a healing impact and remind ourselves that we are all ONE. Awakin gatherings started when three friends got together in 1996 to sit in…
In a unanimous decision On July 27, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled against oil companies and in favor of the Inuit hamlet of Clyde River in a landmark ruling that will have far-reaching and lasting impacts across Canada in terms of Indigenous rights and resource extraction projects, including Arctic oil exploration, tar sands and…
Summary of an article by Amy Yee, Correspondent, CS Monitor, July 20, 2017 Two dozen men and women sit in a circle at a training center an hour’s drive from Dakar, the capital of Senegal. They are Muslim teachers, religious leaders, and community heads from Ghana and Nigeria who are participating in a workshop offered…
March 7, 2017, National Geographic http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/03/felix-finkbeiner-plant-for-the-planet Children are not often invited to speak to the United Nations General Assembly. But there stood Felix Finkbeiner … with a somber question about climate change. “We children know adults know the challenges and they know the solutions,” he said. “We don’t know why there is so little action.…
When Stefano Boeri imagines the future of urban China he sees green, and lots of it. Office blocks, homes and hotels decked from top to toe in a verdant blaze of shrubbery and plant life; a breath of fresh air for metropolises that are of fumes and dust. Last week, the Italian architect, famed for…
Thanks to Jamila Afghani and the organization she created, Noor Educational and Capacity Development Organization (NECDO). 6,000 imams in Afghanistan have taken gender-sensitivity training Click here for the full story of this amazing, courageous woman: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Making-a-difference/2017/0105/Thanks-to-this-Afghan-woman-6-000-imams-have-taken-gender-sensitivity-training It is Friday noon in Kabul, Afghanistan, and men dressed in traditional clothes hurry to mosques to pray in…
Sita Shrestha, 19, took part in a two-day training on leadership organized by the UN Women-supported women’s group SAATHI, in Nepal, following which she helped construct a tap and organize villagers to turn a natural water source into a public space they could share. Sustainable Development Goal 6 seeks to ensure universal and equitable access…
In the USA an estimated 570,000 people are homeless on any one day and in Europe, the latest estimate is 4.1 million. The latest worldwide survey by the UN done in 2005 indicated that 100 million people were homeless, and Habitat estimated that l.6 billion lacked adequate housing. Progress is being made, but not fast…
We bless ourselves in our ability to express the light we truly are at the heart of our being, and thus to become willing tools to uphold, heal and sustain our beautiful planet. Pierre Pradervand, from his Global Oneness Day 2016 blessing. On October 28, 2016 24 nations and the European Union agreed to create…
Imagine you’re working at a school and one of the kids is starting to act up. What do you do? Traditionally, the answer would be to give the unruly kid detention or suspension. But in my memory, detention tended to involve staring at walls, bored out of my mind, trying to either surreptitiously talk to…
Good News Network – http://www.goodnewsnetwork.org The town of Geel has been a sanctuary with a tradition of hospitality toward anyone with mental illness since the 1400s – and such ground-breaking integration was the key to healing success. Resident families volunteer their homes to people affected by mental disabilities by signing agreements with health authorities to…
By Paul Lenda, Guest Writer for Wake Up World, May 25, 2016 Excerpted from from the full article. There is a growing awareness and understanding within the human race of the unity that humanity has with the environment within which it exists. This sense of unity with nature is not something new and indeed has…
A story about love, compassion and devotion. “All the supply in this world is within you and it has to flow out FROM you. It cannot come TO you. If you want to demonstrate supply, you have got to begin with ‘What have I in the house.’ And then you have got to begin to…
In a country where the privileged social status of boys is compelling, it is nice to know that some small villages are bucking the patriarchal tradition. In north east India, in the state of Rajahstan, female infanticide is a tradition. However, a community of 8000 inhabitants, the village of Piplantri, celebrates the birth of each…
… producing honey, protecting trees AND providing income to small farmers!A win-win project wherever acacia trees grow! I bless us in our ability to develop a relationship of deep caring, unconditional love and authentic reverence towards our sisters the bees and all creation. Pierre Pradervand, from his forthcoming book ‘365 Blessings to Heal Myself and…
“I bless the millions of small farmers everywhere that they may learn to regroup to defend their interests and innovate intelligently. I bless those in government responsible for enacting laws and regulations of all sorts that they may be inspired by divine wisdom rather than narrow interests.” From a blessing by Pierre Pradervand Even as…
Great Spirit, give us hearts to understand; Never to take from creation’s beauty more than we give; Never to destroy wantonly for the furtherance of greed; Never to deny to give our hands for the building of earth’s beauty; Never to take from her what we cannot use. Big Thunder Algonquin prayer Following a decade…
Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world. Nelson Mandela. Education is a challenging undertaking even under the best circumstances. It is especially problematic in countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo which has gone through years of political upheaval and violence, where schools were raided by paramilitary…
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. Margaret Mead What started as a small gesture, feeding destitute children, by 31-year-old Darshan and his friends has turned into a full-blown movement. An email Darshan Chandan sent to a restaurant, after being…
What is the gift economy? In a gift economy, goods and services are given without any strings attached; it is an economic system where it is the circulation of the gifts within the community that leads to increase; in this context, hoarding actually decreases wealth. At its core, gift-economy is a shift from consumption to…
An estimated 19 million children have been caught up in world conflicts but perhaps the most famous may be Amina Ali Nkeki . She was one of 219 Nigerian girls abducted by Boko Haram militants in 2014, and the only one to be rescued so far. After meeting with the Nigerian president, she was promised…
