Please choose Malu ‘Aina for your year end giving
Annual Christmas
Appeal!
Dear friends, December, 2013
Christmas, with its message of “Peace on Earth, Good Will to all,” is a special time of year to pause and reflect. It’s a time to take stock of what is really important in life, the values we hold dear, including our family and friends. It is during this season that I send out an “Annual Appeal” to help sustain Malu ‘Aina’s work for justice, peace, and aloha ‘aina (love for the land). It’s also a time to say thank you for the solidarity over the long haul.
Malu ‘Aina has been planting seeds and sharing food with people in need, the least among us, for 33 years, and all of you have been part of that effort in one way or another. This sense of caring for one another, providing mutual aid, is one of our core values. Oh how I wish we were seeing less need and more justice and joy, but that is not the case. The gap between rich and poor is widening. It appears that personal gain for the .1% has displaced concern for the common good. For many, hope of a better life, is in short supply.
Malu ‘Aina is now in its 637thconsecutive week of sponsoring a Friday Peace Vigil at the downtown Hilo Post Office/Federal Building. Each week a new peace leaflet is prepared for worldwide distribution on the internet and on the downtown street corner. 637 weeks is more than 12 years of ongoing wars and trillions of dollars spent for death and destruction. There seems to always be enough money for new weapon systems and wars, but never enough money for building a more just world, meeting basic human needs and caring for the earth.
Together, we want to see a change in priorities, a world where we fight less and talk more; where love and kindness, not violence, is affirmed as the law of our being; where everyone has the basic necessities of life; where “justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream;” and where we treat the earth, our mother, with the respect she deserves.
In this Holy season, and the year around, we are truly blessed by the gifts of your solidarity – your peace, good will, aloha, and financial help. Thank you for the sharing of your lives. Together, we help each other keep the faith and never give up the promise of peace and hope for future generations. The English philosopher, Sir Francis Bacon, said centuries ago that “wealth, like manure, only does good when we spread it around.” Today, even Pope Francis agrees. Amen!
With gratitude and aloha,
Jim Albertini for Malu ‘Aina
Click on “Subscribe” on the Malu ‘Aina home webpage www.malu-aina.org
Donations are tax deductible if checks are made to: Center for Non-violent Education & Action
P.O. Box 489 ‘Ola’a (Kurtistown), Hawai’i 96760. Phone (808) 966-7622 Email ja@malu-aina.org
1. Mourn all victims of violence. 2. Reject war as a solution. 3. Defend civil liberties. 4. Oppose all discrimination, anti-Islamic, anti-Semitic, anti-Hawaiian, etc.
5. Seek peace through justice in Hawai`i and around the world.
Hilo Peace Vigil leaflet (December 6, 2013– 637th week) – Friday 3:30-5PM downtown Post Office
