Category Archives: Current

Daddy Love

One cold November evening, my husband, Niko, our 5 year old son, Sam and I went to a birthday party in the old school building next to our church. As the evening wound down, Niko started to help with clean up and I decided to take Sam home to bed. Sam and I left out the side door and got into our car.

As we backed out of our parking space and started to move forward, I noticed to our left, up against the Church building, a man sleeping on the sidewalk.

As we turned the corner, I asked, “Did you see that, Sam?”
“What?” He asked.
Did you see that homeless man sleeping on the ground next to the church?”
“Go back, Mom. Go Back! I have got to see that!”

I stopped the car and slowly backed up just to the point where Sam could see around the corner, but not so far that our car lights would disturb the sleeping man. I paused for a moment and then proceeded forward.

“Did you see him, Sam?” I inquired.
“Yep.” He responded. Sam was silent for a long moment and then blurted out, “Finally! Finally, I got to see someone sleeping on the streets. I’ve always wanted to see someone sleeping on the streets.”

I was speechless. I had hoped that seeing this person would illicit a compassionate response from Sam. I was hoping it would instill in him a sense of gratitude for all we have. I was appalled that his response seemed so voyeuristic. Before I could challenge him, however, grace came over me.

Of course this would be his reaction. His whole life he had heard his parents talk about the homeless. He had watched us collect blankets for those who were sleeping on the streets. He had brought canned goods to Church each Sunday for those who were poor and many, many times he had heard the story of how my dad had lived on the streets for 3 years when I was just about his age. How could his 5 year old brain even begin to conceive of what it meant to sleep on the streets? All he had ever known of bedtime was snuggling with mom, being tucked in by dad and falling to sleep to the sound of their voices singing or reading to him.

As we continued to drive, I suddenly remembered that I had a wool blanket in my yoga pack in the back of the car. We did a u-turn and headed back to the old school. In protective momma mode, I decided it was better to ask Niko to help us, then to approach this stranger with our little boy at my side. We found Niko inside, mopping the floor. Together we told him about the man sleeping next to the church and asked if he would please bring the man our blanket. Niko looked at both of us deeply and said, “I’d love to.”

He took the blanket from my arms and headed towards the door. Sam followed close behind him until I stopped him at the exit and said we would wait inside for daddy to return. He looked at me with such disappointment and confusion.

“Please, Mom, please let me watch,” he cried.
“No, Sam. We are staying in here. This man deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. He is sleeping. He deserves privacy.”
“Please, Mom. I promise to be quiet. Please can I watch Dad?

I hesitated feeling very conflicted inside. Finally, I said, “OK, Sam we will go outside and watch Daddy, but we will stay far away and we will be very, very quiet. If you make any sound or do anything to disturb this man, we will come right back in.” He agreed and we quietly walked outside and stood about 20 feet away as Niko approached the stranger.

What we witnessed was a moment of pure grace. The man was lying on his right side facing the church building. Niko walked up to him. He knelt down on one knee, gently put his hand on the man’s left shoulder and asked. “Would you like a blanket?” We heard only murmurings in response. Then we watched as Niko slowly, tenderly wrapped this man in the heavy wool blanket. He started at his shoulders tucking the blanket in under his chin and moving downward towards his feet. When he got to his feet, he wrapped the excess material around and under them creating a cushion between his feet and the cold concrete underneath. Then he put one hand on the man’s hip, and another on his shoulder and tenderly wished him a good night.

I watched in wonder. It was as if it were his beloved son, my husband was tucking in and not some stranger he had never seen before. Tears streamed down my face and a prayer whispered in my heart that this moment would forever be imprinted on Sam’s soul. I prayed that he would know that this, this is what it means to be a man in our world: To go out in to the darkness and to face the unknown bearing the gifts of light, compassion, warmth and protection. In his tenderness his daddy had never been so strong.

I Wish You a Mary Christmas


Last week our host daughter, Mary, came downstairs clutching a pink hat to her chest. Mary is a vibrant young woman from Lesotho, Africa here with the Menonite Central Committee for the next year. She came into my office with her dark eyes smiling and asked, “Is this for me?”
“Where did you find it?” I replied.
“Under my pillow.”
“It must be from the Advent Fairy”, I said.
Stretching out her arms, cradling the pink hat in her hands, and with her face radiant with joy, Mary exclaimed, “I think I like this!” Into the bathroom she went. Standing before the mirror, Mary put on her new hat. Admiring herself this way and then that way, hands framing her face, Mary admired herself in her new hat. “I am a pretty lady…I love myself in my new hat…I am so beautiful…oh I like myself in this hat.” On and on she went. Joy streaming out of herself, love for herself and for her own beauty overflowing, Mary admired herself in the mirror for many minutes. Throughout the day Mary went back to the mirror several times to sneak another peak of herself. I watched in awe and wondered, “How did we white women of America lose the ability to fully appreciate and love ourselves in our bodies? My prayer for you and for me, this Christmas, is that we will sneak a peek in our mirrors and without criticism or shame proclaim our beauty and our deep joy in our own reflections. May you have a Mary Christmas.

Alone

A chorus of raindrops
Sing to Me
Come Home.
Come Home
Alone,
Come Home.

Through the valley of lonliness
And the dark wood of fear,
Come home.
Alone,
Come home.

Leave behind your harem of expectations,
Projections,
and judgements.
Shed your mantel of lonliness,
And rinse away your fear.

For you
Alone
Belong here.

You alone
Are the one
You seek.

Pennies for Peace


In the winter of 2009 we sponsored a Pennies for Peace Campaign to raise money for schools in the remote regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Over 50 schools, businesses and organizations joined us. Pennies rolled in through June and together we raised almost $9000.00. The power of all those pennies will bring in more teachers for the students and make sure students have class rooms to learn in. Together we made a big difference in the lives of these children.

Pennies for Peace: Thank you to Bryant Students


Dear Students of Bryant Montessori,

I am awed and humbled to hear of your remarkable Pennies for Peace campaign. First of all, the amount you have raised is extraordinary. The efforts you have made to help children you don’t know, who are half a world away, are so moving to all of us. It reminds me of something a friend told me once “you have not lived, until you have done something for someone who can never repay you.” I know you are all so proud of what you have accomplished!

Your donation of $8000 can do so much good in Pakistan & Afghanistan. Let me give you an idea, your $8000 can:
• Support one school for a whole year, plus
• Support two advanced students with scholarships, plus
• Pay for one teacher, plus
• Pay for one year’s school supplies for 40 students

When you got started did you ever know you were going to go so far? But what is almost more important is the time and effort you have put into learn about a part of the world so different than yours. I hope in this process you saw the differences between your lives, and the lives of the students in Pakistan and Afghanistan, but I also hope you saw the similarities. Because after all, we are more similar than we know!

If Greg Mortenson were with you today he would tell you two things: 1) Always learn! Always look around the next corner and find out new things about the world; and 2) Take the time for tea, take the time to build relationships, in you school, in your community, and around the world.

Congratulations on your remarkable Pennies for Peace campaign. We are honored to have you participate.

Kindest regards,
Christiane

Christiane Leitinger
Pennies for Peace, Director
A Program of Central Asia Institute
P.O. Box 7209
Bozeman, MT 59771
Tel: 406-585-7841, Direct Line 303-674-7940
www.penniesforpeace.org

“Building bridges of peace, one penny at a time.”

Pennies for Peace: Business Supporters


Thank you to the following schools & businesses for supporting Pennies for Peace:
Associated Ministries
Backstage Video
Bellarmine High School
Body Sacred Therapies
Building Better Bodies
Commencement Bay Coffee
El Charro Mexican Restaurant
Franklin Elementary
Garfield Book Company at PLU
Grant Elementary
Hazelwood Road Coffee/Sprague Car Wash
InSpirit Counselling
Interstate Distributor Company
Intuitive Mind
Justrite Printing
King’s Books
Law Enforcement Support Agency
Main Attraction Hair Salon
Mason Middle School
McIlvaigh Middle School
Metro Parks
NFL Americorps
Northwest Leadership Foundation
Old Milwaukee Café
Peace Community Center
Roger’s High School-Puyallup
Sound Mind Center
South Sound Healers Network
St. Leo Catholic Church
Studio Malulani
Susan O’Brien
Tacoma City Council
Tacoma City Manager’s Office
Tacoma Community College
Tacoma Police Department
Tacoma Police Dept. of Records
Terra Organics
Trinity Presbyterian Church
Truman Middle School
Unitarian Universalist Church
UPS Community Involvement Center
Urban Grace
Vashon United Methodist
Vintage Apartments
Visalusintacoma.com
Washington-Hoyt Elementary

Attunement

My full “Yes!”
Bellows from my Soul.
Attune my Astral Body.
Raise my vibration so that
I may live life
More Fully,
More Authentically,
More Powerfully,
Myself.

Sing in me a new Song,
So beautiful and true,
That the old, slow tune
Of my past existence,
No longer resonates in
This new place of myself.

Breathe into me the
Story of my life path
With such force that it
Takes my breath away
And I gulp…
I gulp in this new reality
Of ME,
Fully Lived.

Grief

DSC_2750Grief… What do you want of me?
We want your tears
Bottled deep inside
Poured out
And released.
You may not hold them hostage any longer.
They are the expression
of love poured out,
an expression of loss so deep
it cannot be dealt with
in a day
or week
or month.

We demand your full bodied release
Of all your pain and suffering.
We call you to release those deep moans
Of your despair.
We need you to be strong no more,
But to be weak…
So weak that you crumble
And allow life to hold and support you.

You cannot move through this
With mere determination and focus.
It will take surrender to
Being present
To the deep despair,
the fear,
the pain,
And sorrow
Inside you.

KARE
2/06


In December of 2004, my son, Sam made glycerin soap for family and friends for Christmas. Sam was 6 years old and he was able to do about 85% of the project by himself. This gave him an incredible sense of accomplishment. After he had made over 60 soaps, he turned to me one day and asked if he could make a soap for each of his classmates. I looked at him and said, “Sam, you have 22 classmates.” He simply replied, “I know.” I reluctantly agreed and we set to work making more soap.

I brought the soap to Sam’s school the Thursday afternoon before winter break. I put a soap in each child’s cubby and then set out to help his teacher with the kid’s folders. As I was working, a little girl noticed the soap in her cubby. She looked at me and asked, “What is this?” I told her it was a bar of soap that Sam had made for her. She looked at me with the most vulnerable expression and asked, “Sam made this for me?” “Yes, and he chose that animal in the soap just for you.” I watched her tenderly take her soap and show it to her classmates. To each person she said, “Look what Sam made for me.” Not in a boastful way, but with a sense of awe and wonder.

I teared up many times that afternoon as I witnessed Sam’s classmates respond to their soap. When we got home I said to Sam, “Sam, could you believe how much your classmates liked your soap?” “Yea, Mom, Donovan said Sam Rocks!” “Wasn’t that something, Sam?” “Mom, that was AWESOME!” It was the first time Sam really got what it means to give of yourself and to have it received. It was tremendously powerful.

Ten days later we learned that a tsunami had devastated Southeast Asia. We talked about what we, as a family, felt we could do and decided to send money right away. I researched relief agencies and sent our small pittance via the internet. After I sent it, I felt impotent. That’s all we were going to do? Millions of people’s lives had been devastated and we were going to send a little money? I sat with this for 2 days and on the third day I posed a question to Sam. “Sam what if we made soap and sold it to raise money for the tsunami clean up efforts?” “OK, Mom, that’d be good” ”Sam, how much money do you think we could raise?” He put his hand on his chin and thought. Then he looked at me out of the side of his eyes and using his pointer finger for emphasis said, “I bet we could raise $200.00.” “What about $1000.00. Do you think we could make $1000.00, Sam?” “Oh, Mom, That would be impossible!” “Maybe not, Sam. If we got your friends to help us, and got other kids involved we could easily make 350 bars. If we sold them for $3.00 a bar we would raise $1,050.00. He thought for a while and then he looked at me and said, “Mom, I’m not even going to guess.”

That afternoon we started the Tsunami Soap Project. Over 400 young people participated in the Tsunami Soap Project. These children came from 4 schools, 1 Cub Scout Group and 2 Neighborhoods. Through their collective efforts they made over 1800 bars of soap and raised over $6000.00 to help with Tsunami Relief. Each group that made and sold soap chose the relief agency where they sent their funds. Monies went to Mercy Corps, Catholic Relief Services, Unicef, Oxfam, and World Vision.

This project gave our children the opportunity to reach out and do something at a time when they, like us, felt so powerless. It taught them that  they can have an impact when they put their energies together. And it showed them that they really can make a difference.