Sunday, August 10, 2008

An Uplifting Story

Adelaide-based New Zealander, Barrie Hibbert, shares this story:

One of my tasks this week has been to edit the Catholic newspaper “Southern Cross” for reading over the radio next Sunday (10th August).

One small news item caught my eye. It’s a report on a project based an inspired idea which came to a group of Catholic schoolgirls. Here it is, just as it appeared in the paper, heading and all:

UPLIFTING STORY
Students at an Adelaide Catholic Girls school plan to donate more than 100 pre-loved bras to women from the Pacific islands of Fiji. Kildare College, Holden Hill, has been taking part in the Up Lift Fiji campaign this year and had collected 70 bras at the last count. All those who donated have been thanked for their support.

Barrie adds:
The girls of Kildare are to be commended for pioneering this innovative and creative approach to “evangelism” … or “evangelisation”, as our Catholic friends prefer to say.

No doubt there will be critics who will object to this project as yet another attempt to “suppress the masses”. But I am sure it arises out of a sincere desire to “uplift the fallen.”

When the time comes, I hope that Archbishop Philip Wilson will hold a service of blessing and commissioning for the hundred pre-loved bras before they are dispatched to the eagerly waiting women of Fiji. If he is looking for a text for the occasion, I have a suggestion:
“Greater love hath no woman than this: that she should give up her pre-loved support for her friend.” John 15:13 (slightly modified)

[Perhaps this Old Testament reading could also be suggested: “My cup runneth over.” (Psalm 23)]

Related Stories:
100 Years of Support
One Man’s Trash-Collecting Bras for Fiji to Fill the Void

Image:
Liz Baker collecting bras for the Up Lift Fiji campaign (courtesy The Age).