Tuesday Memo: June 8, 2010

Tuesday Memo: June 8, 2010

I want to begin with a thank you to many of IM's friends who answered my call to help us get back on track with our fundraising. Two weeks ago I told you that we've seen a significant reduction in our direct mail campaign and a smaller, though still meaningful, reduction in our corporate and foundation giving. I asked you to step up and help us make up that shortfall and over the past two weeks we've done very well. Thank you!

As many of you know, we have committed to feeding every home-bound senior who needs a meal. The need in our community is great and the number of our Meals on Wheels clients has grown from about 3,950 at the start of 2010 to just about 4,200 this week. Because our game plan is to not have a waiting list, (we haven't had one since last July) we keep adding those who qualify. We had anticipated and budgeted for an average of 4,050 (government contracts pay for a bit less than 3,000) and we've already surpassed that number. In short, this would mean that by the end of the year, we will be serving about 400 more seniors than in January.

So if things continue at the same level, we may be raising less money and spending more than budgeted. Do you see the problem? The net effect of all of this might mean that we could have about a $500,000 shortfall.

We believe that you, our supporters, share our commitment to feed every home-bound senior who needs a meal. And that's what we want to do. To make that possible, we need to hear from you since every meal that we now add is paid for through individuals and corporations, not the government.

Please help us by spreading the word to your friends. Consider sending this email out to your friends urging them to sponsor a senior for a week, a month or a year. It is the collective action of hundreds and thousands of folks just like you and me that will make the difference. It only costs $25 a week to feed a home-bound senior, $100 a month or $1,200 a year.

I promise you, IM will do its part. But we can't do it alone.

We have a new, more efficient web donor site. Please click here to use it! Or you can send your check to IM at 3217 Montrose Blvd, Houston, TX 77006.

NEW DIRECTOR FOR REFUGEE SERVICES

Most of you know that our former Director of Refugee Services, Aaron Tate, left IM a few months ago to take a job leading Church World Services' Haiti efforts - which was absolutely great news for the folks in Haiti (Aaron is quite something). That of course left a big opening here at IM. I am pleased to announce that Ali Al Sudani, one of our staff members, has been promoted to Director of Refugee Services.

Ali's story is an all-American one. Ali arrived in Houston from Iraq as a refugee just a bit over one year ago. He was a translator for the Coalition forces in Iraq and then worked for a Czech NGO called People In Need as a high-level trainer for Iraqi NGOs. After one of his co-workers was assassinated, Ali left for Jordan, applied for asylum in the US and came to Houston. As they say, the rest is history. To learn more about our refugee services and how you can help welcome our new arrivals click here.

A THOUGHT TO PONDER

A bit more than a week ago Michael Berry, a local radio talk host and former Houston City Councilman, told his audience that if an intended mosque was built near the 9/11 ground zero site he hoped someone would blow it up. While he later apologized for his outburst, he has since declared that he still believes that building a mosque so close to the site would be an affront to all those who died and to their relatives.

That's his right, of course. And perhaps some of my readers feel the same. I don't.

We live in very troubled times. I don't need to tell you that. The current tool of choice is to blast anyone who doesn't agree with what one says or holds true. With divisive language, and images to boost our claims to one's cause de jour, the goal is to polarize rather than to find common ground. Anyone who holds a different view is a demon. Political opponents are not just foes, they act with evil intent. Anyone who disagrees is either naïve at best or malevolent at worst.

So a group of Muslims decide to expand a local prayer site with some hopes that by sanctifying time and space perhaps a ray of sunshine might emerge. To the critics they must see this as a craven act to gain either sympathy or perhaps to snub their noses at the world. I choose to believe the opposite; that there is no better way to seek grace than through sacred spaces.

We all need a bit of grace right now. Our Muslim brothers and sisters know all too well that some of their own have done horrible things in the name of their faith. Can anyone of us who are not Muslim claim complete innocence in the world we've bequeathed to our children?

I offer no mercy for those who shattered our world on 9/11. Their acts brought no holiness to the world and I pray that they are punished for all eternity; but there are decent people of every faith who know no better way to exorcise the evil that plagues too much of our world than to build sacred spaces.

As it says in the Bible; 'surely God was in this place and I did not know it.' It is in our holy spaces, our churches, synagogues, mosques and temples that we have a chance to be at our best. For it is in community that we truly come to know our better selves.

Talk to you in two weeks.

Elliot
Elliot Gershenson
President and CEOI
nterfaith Ministries for Greater Houston