Dear Friends!
Thank you so very much for your continuing interest, kindness and concern for our children. All our kids but two are now back to school. Even our blind kids are attending school at a public high school, Viengkham. Only two kids stay home; one of them being our latest angel sent by the Lord, NuNa. NuNa is a 4 year old little girl, who was abandoned by her father, together with NuNa’s 12 year old sister. The father took off with another woman. These two kids were in incredible poverty, and NuNa’s sister, about 9-10 years old at the time, did not go to school and did her best to raise NuNa. The Royal Thai Welfare Department found these two wretched, starving poor children. They are raising the sister and we have NuNa, who has AIDS, and is blind, crippled, partially deaf and mute. She is featured in our latest Sarnelli House Newsletter, written by our nurse, Kate.
We have enough water in the rice paddies and are planting rice every weekend. The staff plants on weekdays. Our fish ponds have lots of water, and we have enough fertilizer churned out from our “factory” for all the fields. The boys are capable of mixing the fertilizer with nitrogen, etc., and finally producing from our mixer and shaker pellets to be scattered in the fields and plowed under, before planting the rice shoots.
This year, besides Fr. Ole, Brother Keng and myself, we have another Redemptorist brother coming to Sarnelli House. He was a member of my first Novice class, back in 1993. He was a brother for years, and then studied for the priesthood, but was rejected for ordination. I hope all goes well with him. Also, we are getting two major seminarians from the Philippines to stay with us. Every year, seminarians from various provinces in Southeast Asia will come to Sarnelli, while they are in the Immersion Program. Also, a new priest ordained in May, Fr. Joe, will begin his first temporary appointment here at Sarnelli.
It is unbelievable that in two weeks time, Fr. Ole will be headed to Rome for a spirituality Course with two other Redemptorists, and then head to Holland and Ireland, to meet with Irish Redemptorists who will help us raise funds for Sarnelli House. I will leave the same day for the U.S., to attend fund raisers and to meet with as many people as possible, who have been so generous and kind to the children. Both of us will be absent from Sarnelli for six weeks or so.
Together with this update, we offer our prayers and concern for all our sick and suffering donors and friends. God bless you all!
Father Mike
