Every cry for help

is a leap into darkness, in hope that there would be safe landing because maybe, just maybe, rescue would be here.

Every cry for help is a belief in hope, even if it was out of utter desperation that this courage was borne - courage to make frailty and neediness so publicly and chillingly known.

Every cry for help is a belief in hope.

all cry out

I don't like it when they saw down trees. The chainsaw cries in reluctance because it is forced to kill. And then, all is silent as life in and on the tree ends. The wind blows and fetches nothing but silt. It does not sing - there are no baby swallows that cry, nor sunbirds that flitter. Nor squirrels or macaques that play amongst the trees.

No leaves to even rustle. And I grieve with the chainsaw for all the younglings who fall with the tree. My heart beats in exasperation.

How long more till the end of this? Sometimes I really feel that my heart cannot take it. Yet somehow, I always manage to.

the struggle for justice

"The poorest people in our world suffer from a lot of familiar problems. They suffer from hunger, homelessness, illiteracy and sickness. And in response, all over the world, people of goodwill bring to bear familiar forms of assistance: we bring food and shelter and education and medicine.

But at the root of much of this suffering is actually a different problem - a less familiar problem - namely, violence. Many times the widow's children are hungry because bullies have stolen her land and she can no longer grow her own food. The street child is homeless because sexual abuse in the home has forced her onto the streets. The young boy is illiterate because he is held as a slave in a brick factory and can't go to school. The teenage girl has AIDS because she has been forcibly infected with the disease while held captive in a brothel.

In such cases we can't meet the root cause of suffering with the familiar remedies of food, shelter, schools or medicine. It simply doesn't meet the need. In fact, we can give all manner of goods and services to the poor, but if we do not restrain the hands of the bullies from taking it away, we will be disappointed in the long-term outcome of our efforts. As the rock-star activist Bono has learned from his work with the poor in Africa, caring for the poor is "not a matter of charity; it's a matter of justice."

This then is one of the things that makes IJM's calling to the church so different. We are calling Christians to address the distinctive problem of violence that lies beneath so much of the suffering of the poor - the suffering that tenaciously keeps so many of the poor in poverty.

To be clear, among the global poor, hunger, homelessness, education and medical care are massive needs worthy of our urgent attention. But the traditional remedies for these problems simply don't address the underlying problems of aggressive violence.

Violence is different. Violence is intentional. Violence is scary. And violence causes deep scars. Accordingly, to deal with violence, Christians must be different."

---

"This then is the ultimate paradox of our despair over injustice. It masquerades in the robes of hard thinking, realistic analysis and modesty, and dismisses hope as illusory, naive and even arrogant. But truth be told, it is despair that has the facts wrong. In the long run, it is always the tyrants and the bullies who end up on the ash heap of history. Sometimes the moral arc of the universe is long indeed. Sometimes unbearably long. But on both small and epic scales, it does bend toward justice. And miraculously, God has given into human hands the power to bend it more quickly to its ultimate destination. This is what the facts of history tell us. Indeed, God intends that our hope in the work of justice be built not simply on bare theological assertions about the character of God but also on the hard factual evidence about the track record of God.

Hope is not simply wishful thinking; it is a fruit of the Spirit born of the spiritual discipline of remembering."

Just Courage: God's Great Expedition for the Restless Christian (2008)

Gary A. Haugen

International Justice Mission: celebrating justice

‎

...punishment of perpetrators, however lawful, is never meant to be our final action in their lives. We show godly love toward a perpetrator by restraining him or her from harming others, but also by praying for their reconciliation with their Maker. Perpetrators of even the most violent, dark crimes still bear the image of God and are so loved by him that God sent his Son to die for them as well.  

Gary Haugen

I've never seen a video on social justice that shows the legal conviction of people who exact harm and injustice on people's lives - and celebrates that! Perhaps my idea of social justice has been romantic. 

Sure, I grieve for people who suffer unjustly and I'm angry at people who exact such harm on others (and themselves). I dream of the oppressed being free, but I have not really thought about the need to also free the oppressors...from the destruction they are bringing.

confines of fear

Have you smelled the fear of cats trapped in dingy, dirty traps by pest control companies? They cry for fear of their lives and it makes your hair stand and your heart frustrated and anxious.

The Holland-Bukit Panjang Town Council of Singapore has reverted to aggressive cat 'removal' to appease complaints from literally a few aggressively animal-hating (i.e. shouting and insulting animal carers)residents. I do not use 'culling' because it typically refers to selective removal of cats with biologically 'inferior' traits so that the other cats flourish.

Cleaners appointed by the town council to do this dirty job have locked kittens in electrical rooms to starve them to death. A shipyard worker and his daughter rescued one kitty out after they realized the mommy cat kept crying anxiously outside at an electrical room for her baby inside.

Another one was seen being strangled by a worker. Others have just been culled by pest control companies in traps so dirty that didn't matter since the cats wouldn't be in them anymore. One community cat who had an ID/microchip was put down by AVA...so what's the point of the ID if you don't bother checking?

A neighbor contacted the President of the Cat Welfare Society a few days back, and the cleaners in our area has been changing every day ever since. While the cleaner used to say that he was appointed by the town council to do so, now he only said "I don't know! I don't know!"

The trouble with such indiscriminate killing is, the cats that are complained about are not caught. The cats who are disruptive and pee to mark territory are the street-smart ones that avoid people. Instead, the people-friendly ones get caught as they are the easiest targets. In this aspect, cat killers are not different from cat abusers. Still, the complaints keep coming in because the territorial, dominant cat of the colony is still not caught - or even neutered!

Wasn't Singapore encouraged to convert stray cats into community cats just a few months ago? In Bukit Panjang, this has BECOME not true even though it has been for the past 5 years. Here, the only cats that can exist are domestic ones - all community cats MUST be put down.

Moral of the story: how long more can you go on appeasing the few, unrepresentative animal-hating people? And what has happened to us who live in the cities? Have we grown so used to concrete prisons and sterility that any nature that is not domesticated is inconvenient and abhorrent? 


"I've been worrying that we all live our lives in the confines of fear" - Ben Howard


----


June 11 update:


Great news! Holland Bukit Panjang Town Council decides to stop 'removing' cats from my estate and is now working with Cat Welfare Society and cat carers. It's also amazing to see how fast the person in-charge changed in his disposition towards cats, so fast it seemed unconvincingly...superficial. Anyway, you can read the awesome news here. 

behind provocation

Every obnoxious act is a cry for help.

Zig Ziglar

This morning, my mom had just been feeding Kitty's mom. As usual the cat hissed, and the baby imitated her and hissed at my mom too! And my mom was melted away by its cuteness. It was just going 'om nom nom nom' while it ate the food.

When it got hit, my mom went down to check the situation. The baby's mom mewed at her and kept staring at her even from a far distance. How to help when death happens?

After the baby's body was taken away, its dad and mom came by and kept sniffing at where it got hit, bled, and died.

Just before it rained today, the baby's mom went back again and kept sniffing and licking at the baby's bloodstains.

My mom teared the whole day. She had seen the baby grow up, and she saw the car tire roll the baby over a good two times.

Most of what I've said..it's what my mom saw. She really cares and she's really compassionate.

So many thoughts in my mind right now, running down different lanes...like a highspeed maze.

Today's been a day of grief.

waking up to death of a small baby

What a cute cat! We had a new baby around the block that looked like this. It belonged to a pair of strays in my area, except that it had blue-green eyes.

(via meejoebee)

When it was born a month ago, it was mewing and mewing while mom went out to find food the whole day so she could nurse it and its other one or two siblings. I never saw them personally until they were about a week-old, but my mom did. She would peer out of the window every day for countless times. When it was about to storm, her heart ached and went out to kitty's mom who hunted for space underneath a car safe enough for her one remaining kitty to play and rest in.

Kitty was one active and playful baby. Once when it started walking, its mom wanted to carry it, but it ducked so that it could walk. Haha! And its mom who had nursed many babies before it was careful to defend it from people. She made good effort to give a good long hiss at us even when we brought food or we just stopped by to look. She wanted as little attention as possible...I guess that tells you how much unwanted attention she's got from people.

And late this morning my mom woke me up to say that a car just drove over kitty. Like literally a moment ago. Kitty liked to play on the wheel, and my mom said Kitty's mom had meowed at it many times to tell it to come down cos it was dangerous. Today, what Kitty's mom feared came true..the wheel rolled over kitty who was playing right on it.

It was spasming in pain for a while and lay limp. Its eyes came out of the socket and blood rolled across the eyeballs. Its tongue was out in foam, and its hairs all stood up - muscle contraction symptomatic of physical death. Its mom licked it once in the tummy and it spasmed for a while, like a baby who jerks for a bit while sleeping.

When I rushed down to look (and my mom for the second time), the sight was more sad than morbid. Kitty's mom hissed at me again and I just looked from afar. The feeling of death.

It was so limp. Now I saw in detail its small paws, with the black paw prints on it. So small and tender, almost like a teddy bear. I couldn't bear to see its distorted face. Squatting and looking at it from its back, this baby looked like it just fell asleep.

Even with so much affection, I couldn't bear to carry the baby to a grass patch away from that parking lot. It was a baby, and it was dead. I felt so uncomfortable, as if the sleeping baby had somehow turned into a morbid body in my mind. My mom, as brave as she is, cringed. She tried to lift the baby by its limp and soft tail, but picked it up on its baby paws instead.

The cleaner in our area knew what happened, and I pleaded him to leave the baby there for its parents. But he came by after we left and dumped it in his trashcart. Its dad and mom were there and came over to sniff where it died to figure out what happened...there goes a month of its mom's intense loving care and protection, and two months of growing it in the womb.

Many kittens in urban areas die within five months of being born from car accidents or trauma.

Death, what a strange thing. Jesus, will there be cats in your new Kingdom?

scum of the earth

The woman who dropped by for a waffle with avocado ice cream talking to herself nonstop...the tired mom and her Down-syndrome son dead asleep on bus 75 at 10.30pm with their bags full of cans and bottles.

The short guy who was shoeless in KL Sentral. He had a club foot and possibly Down syndrome too. I can't help but wonder...were those men making fun of him? They actually bent over from shrieking in laughter at 8am in the morning. He smiled at them, amused. But around the corner, he was almost running; an awkward violent waving of hands to balance his exaggerated, frantic steps. He bobbed away out of my sight.

Lord, how could I have forgotten? That behind every face lies an ongoing story. Broken dreams and new ones, wounds, and desires. Needs and personalities and a million trains of thought.

How can my heart not be broken? Imagine all the ridicule and unwanted attention they get for being something they didn't choose to be.

This scum of the earth as the world sees it, you use for your kingdom. Use them greatly for your kingdom. The endless joy in them...it's from you. Because they are innocent, deliberately kept from doing evil, and you love them.

"Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him?"

James, to victims of the first institutional persecution
against Christ followers in history in the AD 70s

Beyond the Church Bells

(via Samaritan's Purse)

"Some yearn to live within the sound of a churchbell, I'd rather run a rescue mission within a yard of hell."

C.T. Studd, early modern missionary to China,
English national cricketer, late 19th. c

The Killing Man

Pat
04/17/07 at 02:48 PM

Yes, I Gas Dogs and Cats for a Living.
I'm an Animal Control officer in a very small town in central North Carolina.
I'm in my mid thirties, and have been working for the town in different positions since high school.

There is not much work here, and working for the county provides good pay and benefits for a person like me without a higher education. I'm the person you all write about how horrible I am.

I'm the one that gasses the dogs and cats and makes them suffer. I'm the one that pulls their dead corpses out smelling of Carbon Monoxide and throws them into green plastic bags. But I'm also the one that hates my job and hates what I have to do.

First off, all you people out there that judge me, don't. God is judging me, and I know I'm going to Hell. Yes, I'm going to hell. I wont lie, it's despicable, cold, cruel and I feel like a serial killer. I'm not all to blame, if the law would mandate spay and neuter, lots of these dogs and cats wouldn't be here for me to gas. I'm the devil, I know it, but I want you people to see that there is another side to me the devil Gas Chamber man.
The shelter usually gasses on Friday morning.

Friday's are the day that most people look forward to, this is the day that I hate, and wish that time will stand still on Thursday night. Thursday night, late, after no one is around, my friend and I go through a fast food line, and buy 50 dollars worth of cheeseburgers and fries, and chicken. I'm not allowed to feed the dogs on Thursday, for I'm told that they will make a mess in the gas chamber, and why waste the food.
So, Thursday night, with the lights still closed, I go into the saddest room that anyone can every imagine, and let all the doomed dogs out out their cages.

I have never been bit, and in all my years doing this, the dogs have never fought over the food. My buddy and I, open each wrapper of cheeseburger and chicken sandwich, and feed them to the skinny, starving dogs. They swallow the food so fast, that I don't believe they even taste it. There tails are wagging, and some don't even go for the food, they roll on their backs wanting a scratch on their bellies. They start running, jumping and kissing me and my buddy. They go back to their food, and come back to us. All their eyes are on us with such trust and hope, and their tails wag so fast, that I have come out with black and blues on my thighs.. They devour the food, then it's time for them to devour some love and peace. My buddy and I sit down on the dirty, pee stained concrete floor, and we let the dogs jump on us. They lick us, they put their butts in the air to play, and they play with each other. Some lick each other, but most are glued on me and my buddy.

I look into the eyes of each dog. I give each dog a name.
They will not die without a name.
I give each dog 5 minutes of unconditional love and touch.
I talk to them, and tell them that I'm so sorry that tomorrow they will die a gruesome, long, torturous death at the hands of me in the gas chamber.
Some tilt their heads to try to understand.
I tell them, that they will be in a better place, and I beg them not to hate me.

I tell them that I know I'm going to hell, but they will all be playing with all the dogs and cats in heaven.
After about 30 minutes, I take each dog individually, into their feces filled concrete jail cell, and pet them and scratch them under their chins.
Some give me their paw, and I just want to die. I just want to die.
I close the jail cell on each dog, and ask them to forgive me.

As my buddy and I are walking out, we watch as every dog
is smiling at us and them don't even move their heads.
They will sleep, with a full belly, and a false sense of security.

As we walk out of the doomed dog room, my buddy and I go to the cat room. We take our box, and put the very friendly kittens and pregnant cats in our box. The shelter doesn't keep tabs on the cats, like they do the dogs.

As I hand pick which cats are going to make it out, I feel like I'm playing God, deciding whose going to live and die.
We take the cats into my truck, and put them on blankets in the back.

Usually, as soon as we start to drive away, there are purring cats sitting on our necks or rubbing against us.
My buddy and I take our one way two hour trip to a county that is very wealthy and they use injection to kill animals.

We go to exclusive neighborhoods, and let one or two cats out at a time.

They don't want to run, they want to stay with us. We shoo them away, which makes me feel sad.
I tell them that these rich people will adopt them, and if worse comes to worse and they do get put down, they will be put down with a painless needle being cradled by a loving veterinarian.

After the last cat is free, we drive back to our town.
It's about 5 in the morning now, about two hours until I have to gas my best friends.

I go home, take a shower, take my 4 anti-anxiety pills and drive to work.. I don't eat, I can't eat.
It's now time, to put these animals in the gas chamber. I put my ear plugs in, and when I go to the collect the dogs, the dogs are so excited to see me, that they jump up to kiss me and think they are going to play.
I put them in the rolling cage and take them to the gas chamber. They know. They just know. They can smell the death.. They can smell the fear.
They start whimpering, the second I put them in the box.
The boss tells me to squeeze in as many as I can to save on gas.

He watches. He knows I hate him, he knows I hate my job.
I do as I'm told. He watches until all the dogs, and cats (thrown in together) are fighting and screaming. The sounds is very muffled to me because of my ear plugs.
He walks out, I turn the gas on, and walk out.

I walk out as fast as I can. I walk into the bathroom, and I take a pin and draw blood from my hand. Why? The pain and blood takes my brain off of what I just did.
In 40 minutes, I have to go back and unload the dead animals. I pray that none survived, which happens when I over stuff the chamber. I pull them out with thick gloves, and the smell of carbon monoxide makes me sick. So does the vomit and blood, and all the bowel movements. I pull them out, put them in plastic bags.

They are in heaven now, I tell myself. I then start cleaning up the mess, the mess, that YOU PEOPLE are creating by not spay or neutering your animals. The mess that YOU PEOPLE are creating by not demanding that a vet come in and do this humanely. You ARE THE TAXPAYERS, DEMAND that this practice STOP!

So, don't call me the monster, the devil, the gas man, call the politicians, the shelter directors, and the county people the devil. Heck, call the governor, tell him to make it stop.

As usual, I will take sleeping pills tonight to drown out the screams I heard in the past, before I discovered the ear plugs. I will jump and twitch in my sleep, and I believe I'm starting to hallucinate.

This is my life. Don't judge me. Believe me, I judge myself enough.
Bad thing is I'm just as much a devil as Pat is, doomed for condemnation. Many times I have hurt people like Pat in ways I don't know or choose to ignore.

(via New York Bird Club)

"The command was meant to bring life, but for me it brought death. This happened so that I could see what sin is really like; the command was used to show that sin is very evil. Just as everyone must die once and then be judged, so Christ was offered as a sacrifice one time to take away the sins of many people."

Romans 7: 10, 13; Hebrews 9: 27-28

Jesus, thank you for freeing me from myself and from my wounds and trauma to follow you! And love your animals, and your people.

王力宏先生

Dedicated to 王力宏 who will finally return to Hebei, China, tomorrow (Mar. 27) night after three years of wages promised but not given, under the unexpected oppression by ruthless employers.
Thank you for teaching me faith and frustration, my brother.

---------------------------

The many faces behind a building
do you see it?
The walls that hide them
and Cut them
off the rest of the world.

Do you see clearly the eye
that sparks are eating away
The neck that we crush
Mercilessly - right now
All a bloody fun mess.

I'm beside you, I'm with you.
Was I not whipped endlessly
in a bloody fun mess?
Was I not spit upon - naked, crying, trembling
no dignity?

Was I not abandoned by everyone
WAS I NOT ABANDONED BY GOD...for you?

Yet I chose this path,
because I love you.

Don't be afraid to
say I'm afraid or
Sorry.

I love you. Follow me beyond the walls, the mess, the cross, the world...to Love.

"And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him."

1 John 4:16

Without a rich heart, wealth is an ugly beggar.

The heavens must have decided to play some kinda joke with me. After a month's worth of dry weather, it decided to rain the entire day today, on the exact day that I planned to go to the marina barrage with some friends from French class for a picnic. Alors, tant pis, we had a decent enough day with chatting over coffee and shopping, gloomy weather notwithstanding.

The ESP Blackshot competition organised by the ESP Club was held on Friday evening, so I rushed back to the simulations lab after French tutorial. Turns out we over catered, so we had something like 5 trays worth of food unfinished with everyone already bursting at the seams. Unwilling to throw away what was perfectly good food, we decided to pass it to the workers in the building who were still working on the renovations. It was a hellish scene that greeted us when we exited the lift. Compared to our brightly lit and relatively clean floor, this one was very dark with sporadic light sources. Our noses were assaulted by a nauseating combination of sweat and aerosols. We saw an Indian worker painting the wall while wearing a mask. Unfortunately he wasn't wearing protective goggles and his right eye was visibly inflamed.

When I saw that, all my comparatively trivial thoughts vanished and got replaced by a sense of guilt. Here we are complaining about our lives, fretting over our grades and weight while these people are in need of so much compassion. In our design projects labs, protective gloves and goggles are required even with almost no chance of infection. For the poor worker, the state of his eyes and health are simply not worth the cost of a pair of goggles. In the end we had to put the food trays on the only clear surface in the dimly lit room, knowing full well that it'll get contaminated soon enough by the drilling occurring right above it but grateful for the chance to do something good for these people, evidenced by the thankful smiles on their faces as we left. I did construction work before during my NS days and I immediately recognized the exhausted looks on their faces. Construction is shit work, muscles you never knew you had ache constantly and your brain just slows to a crawl. They were working at night so as to minimize the disturbance to the researchers and admin staff working in the building, but it meant that visibility was poor and I wouldn't be surprised if accidents happened.

To me, this exemplifies exactly what's wrong with our society. We consider ourselves kind and compassionate, yet we would rather splurge money on dainty parities or our precious pets than do something for our fellow human beings. Parents would pay close to half a million dollars to send their kids overseas than buy lunch for the workers renovating their house. Teenagers have money to spend days at a cafe and on clothes while engineering graduates from India become construction workers in Singapore because it pays better than an engineering job back home. Yet we shun them like the plague and complain when they want to build a dormitory in our neighborhood. It's just like the mother with 2 daughters who wrote into the forum complaining of smelly NSFs taking the public transport and demanding that they should be banned. I wonder if she'll still say the same after both her daughters get raped by enemy soldiers with her powerless to intervene.

So lest we get caught up in the rat race and self importance, I think it's a stark reminder of the suffering in the world. On my deathbed, I don't want to ask myself exactly what I've done in my life other than the accumulation of wealth and power and be unable to answer. I quote from Matthew 25:37-40. 'Then the righteous will answer him, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and cloth you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?' The king will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.''

Some food for thought. (:

(via Alvin)

Let him sit alone in silence,
for the LORD has laid it on him.
Let him bury his face in the dust—
there may yet be hope.
Let him offer his cheek to one who would strike him,
and let him be filled with disgrace.

For men are not cast off
by the Lord forever.
Though he brings grief, he will show compassion,
so great is his unfailing love.
For he does not willingly bring affliction
or grief to the children of men.

To crush underfoot
all prisoners in the land,
to deny a man his rights
before the Most High,
to deprive a man of justice—

would not the Lord see such things?

Lamentations 3:28-36

a story behind every face

If Michael had not come into our lives it would have been extremely different. With all that being said, we have a different view of life now. We view everybody different than we did. We realized that there’s a need out there that we didn’t really know about. We were living in our own little cocoon. You tend to realize that there is a lot going on out there that you’re not aware of and it brought so much to light. Even relationship aspect-wise, it all brought us closer together. We had that common bond. We went through trenches that a lot of other families don’t go through.

We came out of this as a stronger family. I’m thankful. I also think that we are so much aware of all people now and feelings and their needs. You don’t know what the guy next to you has going on. He’s got mud on his shoes or a tattoo. We’re so quick to judge. We are so, so quick to judge. You don’t know the worth of that person or what they could contribute to society. We tend to put labels on people. There’s a lot of things that we’ve come through so much, I think, the better.

Leigh Ann Touhy on SheKnows.com

that's a lot of slaves

1/11/2010

Dear Dalit Champion,

President Obama has declared today, January 11, as International Human Trafficking Awareness Day and the start of a month-long, nationwide human trafficking awareness campaign: National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month. The campaign ends on February 12, 2010, Abraham Lincoln's birthday.

The State Department estimates that 14,500-17,500 people are trafficked into the United States each year for modern-day slavery. These numbers do not reflect the estimated 100,000 minors that are trafficked within U.S. borders into prostitution, or the uncounted individuals that never receive services or law enforcement intervention.

The numbers in India are far more staggering.

Former ambassadors of the Trafficking in Persons Office at the U.S. State Department, Mark Logan, wrote in 2007 that the largest democracy in the world has the largest number of bonded slaves. On November 15, 2008, in New Delhi, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of India, the Honorable Justice K.G. Balakrishan, stated in a public address, "The scourge of human trafficking needs no introduction. Every year, millions of individuals are trafficked all over the world and are coerced into living conditions that amount to slavery, forced labor and servitude." At the same event, the Honorable Dr. Justice Arijit Pasayat of the Supreme Court of India stated that there was no bigger problem in India today than human trafficking. Also in May 2009, India's Home Secretary, Madhukar Gupta, remarked that at least 100 million people were involved in human trafficking in India. A statement from the Central Bureau of Investigation added that "studies and surveys sponsored by the Ministry of Women and Child Development estimate that there are about 3 million prostitutes in the country, of which an estimated 40% or 1.2 million, are children."

The U.S. can play an essential and constructive role in helping to empower the Indian government to implement its anti-slavery and anti-child labor laws.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke out against human trafficking on December 2, 2009, the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery, stating, "Modern slavery is a global phenomenon and must be addressed with global partnerships between governments, non-governmental organizations, and civil society. Through new partnerships, the United States and the international community will work to rescue and serve survivors, bring traffickers to justice, and create a world where every person has the freedom and opportunity to fulfill his or her God-given potential."

The Social Justice Department of Dalit Freedom Network began its work in Washington, D.C. in 2003. In the last 7 years, DFN has become the leading justice voice for the Dalits in our nation's capital. A dedicated team continues to educate, advocate, and push for legislation to end Dalit trafficking and make slavery history in India. To learn more, contact socialjustice@dalitnetwork.org

To take a stand against Dalit trafficking in India, you can:

• Spread the word
• Start a Facebook Cause (select "Dalit Freedom Fund" as your beneficiary on Facebook Cause)
• Tweet to your friends about National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month (follow us on www.twitter.com/dalitnetwork)
• Send out a MySpace bulletin using the info in this email
• Donate $20 to DFN's work of Social Justice by going to: http://www.dalitnetwork.org/go?/dfn/donate and select Social Justice.

Thank you,

The DFN Team



Dalit Freedom Network 5350 South Roslyn Street Suite 450 Greenwood Village, CO 80111

i'm too proud for God

I feel anger and pride coming over me - not involuntarily, but I've allowed it and actually enjoyed feeling the adrenaline rush of winning arguments even when it means hurting others, and the false sense of superiority it gives me. I'm judging again one of the very persons in my family I've finally starting loving just this summer. I snapped at my dad and appeared patronizing, hoping that he'd see that I AM patronizing him and I can't wait for his conversation to end...just so I can return to my own little haven of video-watching. Those videos were really great and powerful, but I'm not practicing the love they were reminding me to live out.

Please pray for me. It sure doesn't help that the benefit party is coming up this Friday and I'm not in the best spiritual condition I can be as a steward of God to run his party.
----
Dear God, thanks for letting me come to my senses about my pride. It is disgusting and filthy and shameful, but I can't get rid of it at all - more often than not, I enjoy this false sense of superiority that I get from fleeting things like arguments and conversations that make me feel popular or welcomed. And it was pride that drove people to do the worse of things, like the Holocaust, the apartheid, and slavery. Please guard my heart. You warned me thousands of years ago that my heart is very important in how I live life, but it is deceitful above everything else.

And this pride didn't creep back in like a surprise attack. I believed that I could live a life that pleased you without you. I didn't bother to be intimate with you or walk with you in the cool of the day.

Please teach me that I am second, and Jesus is first. Please overwhelm me so much with your love so I believe so! Teach me humility. If I don't take it in, I give you total permission to CARVE or BEAT HUMILITY INTO ME.








More from I Am Second, a campaign in Dallas, TX with powerful videos on how Jesus changed their lives, and now they gladly serve him.

And God, you're right. I'm also a terrorist like Chris Plekenpol. I hated you and I was your enemy, but thank you for sending Jesus to take the blast for me even when I deserved it. You didn't stand back and watch me die because I deserved it for hating you so much I deliberately opposed you in every way I could, even when I knew you were watching. And I AM NOT EXAGGERATING - you can vouch for me about that. You rushed into the bog to pull me out, and taught me that your love changes everything.

Elamurugan Chellan

For 1 1/2 years, Mr Elamurugan's home has been under a spiral staircase in a Serangoon shophouse after he lost his job and had to leave his Kranji dormitory

INDIAN NATIONAL'S TOES DROP OFF ONE BY ONE
FOR MORE THAN A YEAR, HE HARDLY LEAVES HIS HOME
EACH time one of his toes dropped off, he would cry as he wrapped it in paper before throwing it away.

By Celine Lim
10 May 2008

EACH time one of his toes dropped off, he would cry as he wrapped it in paper before throwing it away.

Mr Elamurugan Chellan ended up shedding a lot of tears - he lost all 10 toes on both feet to melioidosis, also known as soil disease.

After contracting the disease while working here as a construction worker in November 2006, the 28-year-old Indian national suffered multiple organ failure.

He was warded in the intensive care unit and put on life support for a week. It would be another 2 1/2 months before he was discharged from hospital.

Today, Mr Elamurugan is still learning to walk without his toes. The wounds on his right foot are still raw.

Recalling how he cried as he threw his toes in the rubbish bin, one by one over a few months, he said: 'It's hard to explain what it feels like. No one should have to go through this, seeing your toes drop off one by one.'

Soil disease is caused by a bacteria found in soil, surface water or mud, and has been identified as a potential bioterrorism agent here, in the US and Europe.

Last month, following a long-drawn negotiation, his former employer's insurer agreed to pay him $45,000 in Workmen's Compensation.

Mr Elamurugan said he had been working in Singapore for about 1 1/2years when he contracted the disease. His job involved digging trenches 3m to 5m deep for cables to be laid in the ground.

He said in Tamil: 'We all wore long-sleeved tops, long pants and rubber boots for work. But from time to time, muddy water would still seep into our boots.'

The farmer's son from Tiruchirappalli in Tamil Nadu was not bothered by the work conditions.

'In my village, everyone walked barefooted in the rice fields because we believe the land is sacred as it feeds us.

'Elsewhere, we wear shoes. I'd never heard of soil disease before.'

Then, in November 2006, he felt a 'pulling pain' in his right thigh.

He saw a doctor and was given painkillers. But a week later, he was running a high fever and the pain in his thigh had become unbearable.

His toes were swollen and had turned a purplish colour.

So on 26 Nov, he went to the accident and emergency department of the Singapore General Hospital.

He was diagnosed with the disease, which resulted in multiple organ failure, said his medical report.

Mr Elamurugan recalled: 'I was shocked that such a thing (soil disease) could happen to me.

'I went for a medical test, including blood tests and X-rays, before I could get my work permit. After a year of work, I had another medical test. Both times, I had a clean bill of health.'

After Mr Elamurugan's condition got better, he was transferred to the hospital's Infectious Diseases Unit, where he remained for two months.

He was treated with antibiotics via a drip for more than three weeks before being given a course of oral antibiotics. The pain in his right thigh was due to 'extensive' muscle inflammation and skin infection as a result of the disease.

Meanwhile, his toes had turned from purple to black. The doctor told him the toes had become gangrenous and could not be operated on.

Then came the shock. His toes would most likely 'auto amputate', or drop off on their own, in the next six months.

He said: 'Even when I saw that my toes had turned black, I was confident that the doctors here could save them.

'When I heard my toes would come off, I was shocked. I thought, 'My whole life is gone.' I can't go home to work in the fields because I can't walk properly. I'm still not married... In India, people look at a person from head to toe.'

He was discharged from hospital on 8 Feb 2007, and over the next seven months, he lost all his toes.

Without them, he could not keep his balance and had to use a walking aid supplied by the hospital to get around.

To make matters worse, he found out he was diabetic and his wounds took a longer time to heal. Blood and pus would ooze out as he hobbled around his temporary lodgings.

He said: 'I hardly left my lodgings. All I did was eat, sleep, wash myself and take my tablets. My friends would buy me food. I had no energy because of all the blood lost.'

Mr Elamurugan also faced financial difficulties as his fight for Workmen's Compensation dragged on.

Six months after being hospitalised, he ran out of cash and had to 'beg and borrow' from his friends.

His work permit expired on 26 Feb 2007 and he was given a special permit, allowing him to remain here while settling his compensation claim, but forbidding him from working.

Mr Elamurugan said he used to earn $18 for a day's work from 8.30am to about 8pm. He was paid $25 if he worked overtime.

He lost his job because of his injury and had to move out of his Kranji dormitory. He ended up paying $150 a month for a space under a spiral staircase in a Serangoon shophouse.

He visits the polyclinic once a month and would pay $15 for consultation and $20 to $30 for medicine each time.

Once he gets his compensation money, Mr Elamurugan plans to return home and hopes to seek a herbal cure for his right foot, which is not healing properly.

He also wants to be fitted with prosthetics that will enable him to walk properly so he can work again.

But he said initial enquiries by his family placed the cost for the prosthetics in India at about 15 lakhs ($50,000).

Mr Elamurugan said he wants to repay his lawyer, Mr Pritam Singh Gill, who had given him about $250 a month for living expenses for more than a year.

But Mr Gill said he did not want any repayment. He said: 'I felt so sorry for him. Each time I saw him in my office, he'll tell me that he just lost another toe. I collected a token of appreciation from him for my legal fees and that's enough.'

http://tnp.sg/news/story/0,4136,164313,00.html?

Article from a NewsNation forum. More from Migrant Workers Singapore, a blog that documents local news articles on slavery in Singapore. Horrendous amounts of articles, yet there are so many migrant workers in the past few decades who have died and have not been reported at all, according to my dad who was a foreman and a supervisor in Singapore for over two decades. The police wouldn't even bother to come when migrant workers report subcontractors dumping the bodies of migrant workers who died.

Quite a number of believers I talk to get so bored and disinterested, some not even wanting to know about social injustice in the world. But I know it's just a matter of time God convicts them about being compassionate to everyone like Jesus does. I used to be quite like that until he changed me - praise him! I'll quote this again.

Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter.
If you say, "But we knew nothing about this," does not he who weighs the heart perceive it?
Does not he who guards your life know it?
Will he not repay each person according to what he has done?
Proverbs 24:11-12

The Absent Party, Dec 4

Who dat? Yeah it's me (again). I'm running this benefit-birthday party for the Dalits in India. You might know them as the Untouchables in India. Actually, there are also Unapproachables and Unseeables. The Unapproachables have to keep at least 33 feet away from the higher caste people; and the Unseeables may only come out at between sunset and sunrise. "Dalit" has Sanskrit and Latin origins; in Sanskrit it means 'broken, crushed, oppressed'.

Joseph D. Souza comes to speak at Marcus' church each year, and this year he told a story of how this Dalit girl needed the bathroom so bad she took the fastest route to it even though she knew that route was for higher castes - the Dalits had to take a longer path. When she came out of the bathroom, she was burnt alive.

During summer, this teenage Dalit boy got severely electrocuted accidentally. His relatives rushed him to the hospital after he got hurt. And guess what? He died right there waiting for treatment because the hospital was apparently not legislated to treat Dalits.

This party will be held in conjunction with my 21st birthday (which was earlier this month). Anyone is free to come: there'll be free food and live music. You are NOT SUPPOSED to bring any birthday presents for me. Instead, please give the money to the Dalits instead. 100% of the money will go to O.M. India via O.M. Singapore. O.M. India works directly with the Dalits in India, providing microloans (92% success rate), education, legal advocacy, and vocational training for many Dalits in India. Most importantly, they tell the Dalits about JESUS, who truly sets them free with truth. A quarter of the people in India are Dalits, and I've heard of how O.M. India staff sometimes go without food for a few days because they are underfunded (relatively, when you think of the 1600 million people who need help).

Numerous people think this is a great idea, and I only have God to thank for it. Now I'm feeling for the first time what it means to run a slightly bigger errand on behalf of Someone Else. God is letting me run his party, and there could be so many more eligible candidates for this but...he's letting me run this for his Kingdom! Of course, I want to give this party my best. It's really great to know I'm not overstressed out by God's high expectations, because I know that if he wants me to run his party, he will also provide the best. I have faith that he is.

I posted this last spring but I'll put it up here again.

Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter.
If you say, "But we knew nothing about this," does not he who weighs the heart perceive it?
Does not he who guards your life know it?
Will he not repay each person according to what he has done?
Proverbs 24:11-12

He will defend the afflicted among the people and save the children of the needy; he will crush the oppressor.
Psalm 52:4

they'll be executed in Afghanistan

I got this text this morning at 11.17am:

"Text from Joyce Meyer's head office - There are 22 Christian Missionary families that will be executed by Islamists in Afghanistan. pls forward this message as fast as you can so that many will pray. Luke 21:12-19; Philippians 1:20-21"

I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.

Paul, former noted anti-believers leader who imprisoned believers in 1st c. A.D. He later turned into a powerful servant and preacher after Jesus appeared to him while he was on his way to the Syrian capital, Damascus, to imprison more believers - men, women and children.

Please pray

Please pray for all our friends in Padang (Indonesia) hit by the earthquake, and our friends in the Philippines, and Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh (India) hit by Typhoon Ketsana. I think Ketsana is supposed to either RETURN to the Philippines or hit Taiwan after India. Aid isn't getting through and the Indonesian government is not keen on rescuing people because they've just been digging up bodies.

It dawned upon me that ANYTHING can take the away our lives in a split second. David was done with grieving for a day when his baby died, knowing he'll be heaven. But he refused to be comforted when his dear son Absalom died, because he knew Absalom was not a righteous man before God and Absalom was headed for hell. We can be so happy for believers who are released through death, but not so for our nonbeliever friends and the lost.

Let's live Jesus! The Kingdom is coming and I'm so excited, but time is running out for the lost!!!