2009-10-16   Party meal for former street sleepers,
now residents at House of Hope, near Jordan MTR, Kowloon

"When you have a party, invite the poor..." - see true story below

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Mark 8:1-10  and Luke 14.12

In 1972 during a prayer meeting in  El Paso, Texas,  people  read Jesus' words  “When you give a lunch or a dinner, or when you have a party, invite the poor." The prayer meeting decided that on Christmas day that year  they would give a Christmas lunch to the poor people  who lived and worked in the dump in Juarez,  just across the border in Mexico. The poor people in the dump used to separate the rubbish into various types, cans, bottles, cardboard etc and then sell it to a co-op which would in turn sell it on.  The prayer group  prepared food for 125 people on Christmas Day.  But 350 people turned up.  The prayer group leaders  explained to the poor people that there was not enough food for everyone but they would share what they had. All 350 had enough food, the dump people even  took some food home and then came back to take more home, then returned and took more home again. There was still so much  food left over  that it was taken to  three orphanages. The miracle of the loaves and fish was repeated in the dump in Juarez, Mexico in 1972.

This true story was made into a movie in 1981  

Dear Jesus, please help us to do more for the one billion starving people of today's world. Help us to feel sorry for them, just as you felt sorry for the hungry people in today's Gospel.  And ... please bless our efforts, just as you blessed the loaves and fish.