Changing the World- One Dalit at a Time

The life of a Dalit is full of hurt, abuse, and rejection, they go through every day believing that they're worth less then cattle and subject to being sold into modern day slavery. A Dalit is the lowest rank on India's social and economic scale, and are also known as the untouchables. Dalit children are not allowed to go to school, so they cannot get any well paying jobs and are stuck in the cycle of abuse and poverty for generations. To help free these people, my school started F.I.G.H.T. club, which stands for Fighting Injustice and Giving Hope for Tomorrow. We're raising $40,000 to furnish a Dalit School in MySore, India through the Dalit Freedom Network. Our heart is for the Dalit people to be freed from modern day slavery and most importantly, know the amazing love that God has for them. We're a little over halfway there, but our hope is to finish by the end of the school year. Could you please pray about helping our club meet this goal? You can make a donation through the link provided below, please scroll down to CCA F.I.G.H.T. just under The Education Fund. The website also has a lot more information if you're hungry to know more, and you can become a fan of F.I.G.H.T. club on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/FIGHT-Club/196566400354337 . Thanks for reading and please remember to pray for the Dalits.
Here's the Link!
http://www.dalitnetwork.org/go?/dfn/donate
P.S. I realise that there's hardly a chance that anyone will actually donate considering that my only two followers are actually in F.I.G.H.T, but you never know, the Lord works in mysterious ways.

Love and Respect

Imagine a time when guys actually held doors, pushed in chairs and acted chivalrous for ladies. It would be beautiful, right? Well, this past week, my grade went to relationship boot camp, also known as our Sophomore Retreat. Every girl in the grade gets a note card with the name of a boy in the grade, and given the task of honoring them by getting them the perfect gift and writing them a letter about why you respect them. Likewise, the guys get a girl's name and then have to write them a letter and find a gift, but the guys also have to take the girl of a mock date. I know, it sounded crazy to me too, and the thought of my first date being with a guy that I didn't know very well didn't sit well with me, but I reluctantly went anyway. We stayed in a hotel for three days and learned how to love and respect in all of the relationships in our lives. We went to classes taught by pastors and teachers, played team building games and, yes, went on a mock date. I learned so much during those three days, here are the main points.

1. Our current relationships are practice for marriage. How we treat our parents, friends, siblings and others in authority are good indicators of how we will treat your spouse. Do you respect your parents?  Have good friends? Learn to live with your sibling's flaws? These were questions that I wrestled with these past couple of weeks. How I treat these people now mirrors how I will treat my husband someday.
2. Marriage isn't as easy as it looks. You'd think that as a product of a broken home, I would know that, but I had always just thought that my parents just married each other before they were Christians and for the wrong reasons. Now thinking about it with a new perspective, I see that my parents' marital problems were fixable, and that if they ever happen in my own marriage someday, it will be tough, but the outcome doesn't have to be divorce.
3. Purity is worth the wait. The girls who went on this trip had a lot of time to talk with women who were already married. I listened as ladies gave their testimony, some had waited for their husband, others had not, and I was encouraged toward purity by both. One woman shared that her husband cried on their wedding night because he was so thankful that she waited for him.

When the time came for the date, I was super nervous. I didn't know if my date was excited or dreading it, and what it would be like. I was totally pleasantly surprised. He was a total gentleman, serving my food from the buffet, holding doors, and pushing my chair in. It wasn't awkward and I had a lot of fun. He also got me a perfect gift and a note that I will treasure forever.

We all need to learn how to love and respect now, that chivalry isn't dead, and that we should respect ourselves enough to set boundaries in relationships.