Let There Be Light

During our trip to Mavila in Mozambique, we set up a solar powered system with a 12 volt battery backup to run light for six rooms and a few plugs. These two panels should provide about 140 watts of power per day. Thank the Lord Scott Beathard was with us to help with the wiring from the panels, to the regulator, to the batteries, to inverter, to the light fixtures and sockets; otherwise the priests would still be sitting in the dark. In the picture, Jill and Andrea have just finished mounting the panels on the roof right above the priests' bedroom. Since theft is a big problem in a place where people literally nothing, this spot would make the panels the most difficult to steal, "Hey Father Kailesh, either that's one big squirrel or someone is trying to swipe our juice!" Watch out General Electric, these women can do anything!

Fresh Coconuts

There are a lot of incredible things about Mozambique and the Fransalians that we work with there. One of the most memorable is always going to peoples homes for afternoon tea, or in this case, coconut milk. Visiting with the locals, hearing their stories and sharing a few laughs is enjoyable, but the hospitality that they share is genuine and a good lesson for us all. Mozambiquen lesson proverb, "Never mess with a woman and her machete"

Why Orant exists:

There is nothing we can offer to God more precious than good will. But what is good will? To have good will is to experience concern for someone else's adversities as if they were our own, to give thanks for our neighbor's prosperity as for our own; to believe that another person's loss is our own, and also that another's gain is ours; to love a friend in God, and bear with an enemy out of love, to do to no one what we do not want to suffer ourselves, and to refuse to no one what we rightly want for ourselves; to choose to help a neighbor who is in need not only to the whole extent of our ability, but even beyond our means. What offering is richer, what offering is more substantial than this one? What we are offering to God on the altar of our hearts is the sacrifice of ourselves.
Gregory the Great, 580AD