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RSSJuly 18, Proper 11
by the Rev. Barbara Cawthorne Crafton for ERD
7/18/2004
Genesis 18:1-10a(10b-14)
Psalm 15
Colossians 1:21-29
Luke 10:38-42
"And she had a sister Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching." -- Luke 10:39 (NRSV)
Gloria has always lived in the village of Uma, in the northern Philippines. She is a farmer, growing rice and selling it herself. She has had very little schooling: you don't need to go to school to pound rice out of its brown husks with a heavy stone pestle. She works with the rice all day, every day, always pounding, pounding, pounding. Gloria is a tiny woman, and the pestle is heavy. It is the only work she has ever done, and she has done it all her life.
Everyone in Uma raises either rice or coffee. And everyone means everyone, including the children of Uma. But Gloria dreams of school for her children instead. She dreams that their lives will not be a replication of her own hard life.
Episcopal Relief and Development, in partnership with the Episcopal Church of the Philippines, has bought Uma's residents something that could make that happen: a motor-driven rice mill. Now Gloria and her neighbors don't have to pound the rice out of its husks manually: the mill can do it in a fraction of the time it used to take. The children don't have to help with the processing - one person can do the whole job with this machine. Now Gloria's children can go to school.
The people of Uma are proud of their miraculous rice mill. Everyone makes more money, and women can learn to do other work besides pounding rice. Families can buy different kinds of food for a better diet. And best of all, the children of Uma can go to school every day.
Everybody has to eat. Everybody has Martha duties. But everybody has the right to be Mary, too, and grow into the full stature God intends.
Episcopal Relief and Development saves lives and builds hope in communities around the world. We provide emergency assistance in times of disaster. When the immediate crisis is over, we rebuild devastated communities and offer long-term solutions in the areas of food security, health care, and HIV/AIDS.
