Nine-year-old Joseph may be blind, but don’t think of him as disabled. Think of him as a child with a special skill that most of us don’t have.
Joseph, who is blind, has learned to identify his classmates by touch and smell. During a visit this month to the Chizombezi Deafblind Center in Malawi, Cross Catholic staff members watched Joseph place his hands on his classmates’ faces and identify each one of them by touch and smell.
Last year, the United Nations projected a rise in world hunger to 1.02 billion people – more than one-seventh of the global population! Statistics on hunger are always rough estimates, and the results can vary greatly from one study to another. But one thing seems clear: the U.N. number is no exaggeration. In fact, it may be too conservative!
If you’ve ever wondered where the most religious place on earth is, a new study from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life has an answer: sub-Saharan Africa. More specifically, the countries south of the Sahara Desert and north of South Africa.
It is sometimes difficult to hear the heartbreaking stories of the people we help, especially when they involve children. What keeps us encouraged are the stories we receive from our partners detailing how dire situations have been turned around and lives are renewed.
Now that Lent has begun, Catholics are spending even more time in prayer and fasting in the weeks leading up to Easter, when we will celebrate our Savior’s resurrection.
In honor of World AIDS Day, Pope Benedict XVI recently gave a talk at St. Peter’s Square: “The Church never ceases to strive to combat AIDS through her institutions and personnel dedicated to that task. I call upon everyone to make their contribution, with prayer and tangible assistance, so that people affected by the HIV virus may experience the presence of the Lord Who offers comfort and hope.
