Meeting Minutes 11/29/00

Sister Parish Committee meetings are held the first and third Wednesdays of each month at 7 pm. in the school. Newcomers are always welcome. If you have questions, please contact any of the members of the committee.

What follows are the minutes of the Wednesday, November 29, 2000 meetings.

Wednesday, November 29, 2000

Present: Mindy, Jeff, Mark, Joel, Decklynn, Julie, Louise, Carol K.

Louise announced that the library in Panajachel burned down last week probably due to an electrical short circuit. Everything is destroyed. This included 8000 books, 6 computers, and 8 years of effort to create a model library in Guatemala. Users were allowed to borrow the books at no cost like we do in this country. Most libraries do not allow users to take the books to their homes. This was the library we sent some children's books to last year with the youth delegation.

Julie announced that January 28th will be Immigration Sunday at SJA. The speaker will be a representative of Oficina Legal. This was one of the stops on the last delegation.

Julie and Louise proposed a Spanish Culture Immersion series for the parish. Brainstorming led up to a Lenten series of Saturday late mornings/early afternoons including Spanish language basics, cultural education, and a field trip/lunch for the participants to a local cultural institution. Many of the same institutions we used for the delegates would be possibilities. This would be a series, but participants could sign up for one day if they choose. The goal is to have this roughed out to present to the parish on Immigration Sunday in the bulletin. Louise will contact Susan to see if she could help with contacting the institutions since she has done most of the legwork for the delegation.

The next SJA/TNII joint bible study will be on Thursday, Dec. 7th at 7 pm at Carol's house. Call her at 612.822.5282 for details.

Louise suggested a Thanksgiving summary letter be sent to TNII. It would explain our cultural traditions and what we all did. Several ideas were discussed as to how to create the letter. We brainstormed enough things to say that Louise decided she could write it herself representing our ideas. If you have good Thanksgiving stories to share with our hermanamiento, email Louise at eidsmoel@aol.com.

Our Sister Parish Party at Vickie's house will be Saturday, January 27th. Details to be released later, but please mark that evening on your social calendars.

Julie reported that the Centro Cultural Chicano is looking for help on the 23rd of December for a Christmas party for kids at their building. They are looking for 3 different shifts of help: Friday the 22nd to set up, 9am-1pm on Sat the 23rd, and 1-5 pm on the 23rd. The latter two are to help with the party(signing in kids, etc.) They would also appreciate donations of cups, paper, plasticware, etc. For any of the above, call Sara Holmdahl at 612.874.1412.

Jackie sent Louise some more questions for delegation follow-up evaluation. We discussed some of the questions. Among the thoughts:

Carol was impressed talking to Rosita and Tobias about the difference of lives of young people in our 2 countries. Rosita and Tobias work in a factory for 12 hours a day, six days a week and earn about $40 a week. We noted that these wages are an increase from what we were seeing in similar situations a couple of years ago. Cost of living has also increased in Guatemala.
We commented on the depth of understanding of the bible of our Guatemalan friends compared to us. How the bible is so much more a part of their daily lives than it is here. Carol and Rick also commented on the differences in style between Mario representing the charismatics and the other adults representing the traditional church. They also noted how each seemed genuinely interested in the others interpretations and that they appeared not to know much about how the other group functioned.
We commented on how active the delegates were in participating in our homily compared to our reticence to get involved in their service when we are there. Is that due to our lack of self-confidence or ???
We felt that there was not enough meeting time. We also were realizing that TNII likes to have the 1st meeting just a get-together and later meetings be the business. We want to just jump into business. They value the relationship aspect more.
Many commented on Aura's strength during the homily in a strange place.
Someone commented on the day we showed them a "poor Americans" house and then a wealthy Lake Minnetonka home. The comment was that the difference may have been lost on them as even the poor person's home was physically more wealthy than the average TNII home.

There will be no meeting in December. We return to the 1st and 3rd Wednesdays in January.

Next Meeting: Wednesday, Jan. 3 7 pm. Classroom 101
Jeff