PARAGUAY, Noelia Ferreira/fma. Greetings to my sponsor Elizabeth, I thank you from the bottom of my heart and together with my family, I send you this greeting”: Liz Paola, 14 years old, smiles shyly as she holds out the card with her message. This is how she greets her sponsor, via email, who lives in a distant country, in Germany. Her German sponsor, who turned 80 today, has made it possible for this girl from a poor family in Paraguay to attend school for the last eight years. This is one of the moving stories from Dequení which has been changing the lives of many Paraguayan children for 27 years. It is inspired by the Covenant of Love, creating a covenant culture: covenants between poor families, volunteers, companies, well meaning people in and outside Paraguay, and Schoenstatt people from all over the world who want to add their little grain of sand to eradicate child labour in Paraguay – the product of poverty and lack of education.
Over the last few days hundreds of people from Germany and Switzerland received letters of thanks from children in Paraguay. “How do you imagine your sponsor?” the children were asked and in response they drew people with big hands and hearts floating in the air: “She has big hands to help, an open heart to shelter, eyes that see me…” “Thank you for the message,” wrote Irene E. of Karlsruhe, Germany. “We will put these pictures in the kindergarten and hope that we can send more bursaries.”
Many bursaries for children like Johana Isabel.
“When I grow up I want to be a children’s lawyer”
She is 14 years old and lives with her mother and three younger brothers in the 24 de Junio district in San Lorenzo. In the afternoons she attends the 5th Grade class at the San Juan Bautista School in the same city.
Before joining the Project, Johana was very young when she used to go everyday with her grandparents and a brother to beg for money at the traffic lights in the area around Mariscal López Avenue, which is also known as the death bend (due to the frequency of serious accidents). A Dequeni collaborator visited them daily in their place of work, until they became familiar with the foundation and her mother and grandparents understood the consequences of keeping her on the street, destroying her health, and keeping her back in her education … Since then (7 years ago) Johana has attended activities at the centre every morning and says: “I never want to go back to the streets” and adds that she does not like to see children working. Since she joined the programme, she says that “my grades have improved, I study hard, and when I grow up, I want to be a children’s lawyer!”
Missionary Advent
How often do we dream about changing the world, doing something to alleviate poverty and injustice, contribute to the birth of a new social order, a world that more just, has greater solidarity, more of God? How often do we dream of being agents of change, to be able to tell stories to future generations of what we did? How often have we dreamt with the birth of our Saviour in our midst?…It is possible. We are part of Schoenstatt’s missionary Advent. Dequeni can help to make these dreams come true: by sponsoring a child (400 US$ or 310€ annually) or giving a child a bursary (60US$ or 55€ per school year) or giving a small donation which will go very far. In the meantime, Dequeni dreams – and works towards this dream – that no Paraguayan child should remain on the streets because he/she lacks the means to go to school.
At the large thanksgiving gala held at the end of November of 2012, the following words could be seen on a giant poster: Thank you for being Dequeni.
Thank you Dequeni, for being Schoenstatt.
Donations from Europe (SEPA):
Cuenta bancaria Ingrid Springer IBAN. DE52426613300121483602; BIC: GENODEM1HLT
