March 2024 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
Executive Director’s Reflections Teaching Dignity, Pride, Compassion Can you imagine teaching a kid to do chores who has only everbeen forced to clean with beatings or abuse? Can you imagine how a child learnstenderness and compassion when any vulnerability was exploited, seen as aninvitation to abuse? Well, at COAR the ritual of Holy Thursday, the […]
December 2023 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
Executive Director’s Reflections Dignifying lives & healing hearts; WE ARE ALL called to be builders of peace I was moved to tears, proud and happy tears, when they rushed up to me with the new shirts emblazoned with their new motto: WE ARE ALL called to be builders of peace (on the front); Dignifying lives […]
It’s a Fiesta!
(Photo credit: Nuestra Señora del Pilar parish Facebook page) In every little town in El Salvador (there are 262 of them!), you’ll find, once a year, the fiestas patronales of that town. Originating as a celebration of the feast day of the town’s patron saint, the fiestas are a cross between a county fair, a […]
September 2023 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
Let’s Talk About Child Trafficking With this summer’s popularity of the movie, The Sound of Freedom, we welcome the attention to human, and child, trafficking. So, let’s talk about “child trafficking”. It conjures images of abduction by strangers, transport across legal jurisdictions, huge amounts of money changing hands, and shadowy “consumers” of those trafficked. The […]
June 2023 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Executive Director Reflection… Lots of events this newsletter: The COAR kids celebrated the Pope’s World Day of Peace with Archbishop Escobar and Cardinal Rosa Chavez in February. Then they celebrated the anniversary of Fr. Ken’s death, March 2, 2002. That is always a big feast at COAR. This year it […]
March 2023 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
Programs Director’s Take-Over One of the things that has most impressed me about COAR is the dedication of our staff and the 40 years of tradition we have in caring for El Salvador’s most vulnerable population. But 40 years of tradition doesn’t have to mean stagnation. It’s a wonderful thing to see our kids grow […]
December 2022 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
“Treated No Better than a Rag” In our regular meetings at COAR we learn the heart-breaking details about how the newest children and teens have come to be at COAR. They are minors so we shield their privacy as well as, literally, keep them safe from their past. At our most recent, mid-November meeting, our […]
September 2022 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
Healing Body and Soul Welcome to all who learned about COAR this summer through one of our (50!) mission appeals in Catholic Churches around North America. For all our supporters, old and new, healing body and soul is what COAR is all about. Healing the body requires good food, good education, and safety. Healing the […]
June 2022 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
The House That Generosity Built Time, Talent, and Treasure I am surrounded by generosity. From our honorees this year it was generosity of spirit to lend us their names and faces as representatives of all the many volunteers that help connect the COAR children to you. For our hundreds of volunteers, it is generosity of […]
March 2022 – Executive Director’s Reflections & News from El Salvador
The Last Shall Be First – Remembering Raul, continued (<==Continued from the main obituary and pictures.) This was an email that I sent to a donor just after I learned of Raul’s death. It is my message to all of you, too: He was rushed to the hospital on December 30th with chest pains but […]