My Calendar
Week of Nov 20th
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Transgender Awareness Week Transgender Awareness Week
13/11/2020 – 19/11/2020
International Day for Tolerance International Day for Tolerance
16/11/2020
International Day for Tolerance
Here's a quite wonderful video (4 mins 17 secs)
Which of these people do you:
- most admire?
- most agree with?
- most want to be like?
Perhaps tolerance is a simple as following the teaching of Jesus to "Treat others as you'd like to be treated!"
A PRAYER FOR TODAY
While the United Nations designates today an International Day for Tolerance,
we know that you, God of all people, call us to something higher,
to something beyond mere tolerance.
We pray that you would enable and empower us to be people of love and compassion,
who actively seek the good of the other and work to to that day when people from all tribes and tongues might come together in peace, embracing and delighting in our differences.
Amen
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Transgender Awareness Week Transgender Awareness Week
13/11/2020 – 19/11/2020
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Transgender Awareness Week Transgender Awareness Week
13/11/2020 – 19/11/2020
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Transgender Awareness Week Transgender Awareness Week
13/11/2020 – 19/11/2020
International Men's Day International Men's Day
19/11/2020
Imagine a group of people whose members:
- suffer 70% of murders in the world;
- account for 85% of homeless people;
- serve 64% longer jail sentences than others in society;
- die 4-5 years earlier than a similar sized group;
- are twice as likely to die from heart disease or lung cancer than others.
They're shocking statistics, aren't they? By the way, the group in question is MEN!
WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT? (1 mins 53 secs)
This is an INTERESTING TAKE ON WHAT IT IS TO BE A MAN (2 mins 58 secs)
A PRAYER FOR TODAY (available as a 1 minute video HERE)
Loving God,
we hold before you especially today - the men in our lives;
help all of us to deepen our understanding of gender roles and expectations;
that we might live life in all its fullness,
building families, communities, societies and a world of openness and acceptance.
Help us not to be bound by stereotypes
but to enjoy the diverse nature of every human being.
We pray this in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. AMEN
World Toilet Day World Toilet Day
19/11/2020
Did you know that:- 4.2 billion people live without safely managed sanitation – more than half the global population. (WHO/UNICEF 2019)
- 673 million people still practise open defecation worldwide. (WHO/UNICEF 2019)
- Today, at least 2 billion people will have to use a drinking water source contaminated with faeces. (WHO 2019)
- Inadequate sanitation is estimated to cause 432,000 diarrhoeal deaths every year and is a major factor in diseases such as intestinal worms, trachoma and schistosomiasis. (WHO 2019)
- 297,000 children under five are estimated to die each year from diarrhoea as a result of unsafe drinking water, sanitation, and hand hygiene. (WHO 2019)
All of the above is not because we don't have the technology! After all, human beings went to the Moon over 50 years ago! Do we, and the governments who serve us, need to re-align some priorities?
Let's spend a few moments imagining what it must feel like not to have a toilet.What might you have to do if there was no toilet available?
Why might this have a disproportionate effect on females?
What are the possible consequences of not having a toilet?
A PRAYER FOR TODAY (from CAFOD)
Loving God,
we pray for a world of justice
where everyone has access to
a toilet and clean water.
May all our sisters and brothers throughout the world
be able to live in the dignity they deserve
as children created in your image.
Amen
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Africa Industrialization Day Transgender Day of Remembrance Transgender Day of Remembrance
20/11/2020
World Children’s Day World Children’s Day
20/11/2020
Welcome to World Children's Day! This used to be called Universal Children's Day but the day has been re-branded!
This day was set up in 1954 by the United Nations. In 1959, the UN agreed its Declaration on the Rights of the Child. In 1989 the Convention on the Rights of the Child became the most widely ratified international human rights treaty, setting out a number of children’s rights including:
- the right to life,
- to health,
- to education
- to play,
- to family life,
- to be protected from violence,
- to not be discriminated,
- and to have their views heard.
Here's a short but brilliant video (1 min 17 secs) from the children of Yemen!
Here's another video clip (2 mins 54 secs) which gives a bit more information and which includes one particularly surprising fact about a country which does not give its children the same rights as others around the world!A PRAYER FOR TODAY (available here as a 1:00 minute video)
Loving God,
Jesus said "Let the children come to me"
and so we pray for children around the world,
that they will feel loved, valued, cared for and encouraged.
We pray for adults that they will enable children
to enjoy a childhood they can look back on happily.
We pray too that all of us acknowledge each other - whatever our differences -
as children made in your image,
who deserve to be treated with dignity and love.
We pray this in the name of the Father, and of the Son,
and of the Holy Spirit. AMEN