Concert for Peace and Reconciliation

My dear Friends
I am happy to tell you that I gave another Concert for Peace and Reconciliation last Tuesday evening. The venue was somewhere i had sung exactly three years ago-the Lee Hall in Wolfson College in Cambridge. It is a lovely hall, and during the day you can see how it bordered by an English garden on one side and a Chinese one on the other, to reflect its Chinese benefactor.

I sang my usual mix of traditional folk songs from America and Scotland-John Riley(about a girl being reunited with her long lost lover) and the Skye Boat Song, about the daring escape of Bonnie Prince Charlie on the island of Skye. What was so beautiful was that all the audience, about thirty of them, joined in the music. This has a special meaning, as the communal singing is like a prayer which in some mystical and mysterious way rises up and contributes to the healing of the world, or Tikkun Haolam, as the Rabbis called it.

I included in the first half a cycle of Sabbath songs, all traditional and which I remembered from my childhood. They sart with the song to the ministering angels that the mother sings as she lights the Sabbath candles, as a homage to the angels which accompany the father as he comes home from the Synagogue. They continue with the melody of repentance and the tree of life, as the Torah is returned to the ark in the Synagogue. Continuing with the Grace after meals sung by Russain and Polish Jews all over the world, I concluded with Elijah the prophet and the herald of the Messiah, a sparse and haunting tune fitting to the close of the Sabbath, marked by the appearance of three stars in the sky.

In the second half, I think the highlight was the beautiful anti-war song, Last night I had the strangest dream, written by Ed McCurdy, who preceeded Dylan and Baez and others as the father of modern folk.

There was a mixed audience of Jews and Christians and other friends, with possibly some Muslim students from the college. At the end my old friend Mrs G requested Hava nagila and so the concert finished on an upbeat note!

Shalom from Gila

Happy birthday

My dear Friends
We have just celebrated 13 years since the foundation of The little Sisters of Joy. The original concept was of a Catholic women's community of Prayer, Peace and Reconciliation. Also to be a community of praise. The name has stayed the same but, following on from the starting of an Association of Friends, in 2004 it evolved into an international foundation, with the same aims of Prayer, peace and Reconcilation.

The Friends comprise nearly 700 in 22 countries, including 3 Arab ones, Jordan, United Arab Emirates and Pakistan. Most of the Associates live in the UK but the Newsletters, published twice a year, travel as far as Australia and South Africa.

Yesterday in the Regent family hotel in Cambridge we were only six but we celebrated in style with good food and conversation. 2 of our Jewish Associates were with us and we covered many things.In my Jewish primary school on this Feast i would bring in as many different kinds of fruits as possible.

One of my mentors, who died a few years ago, but feels still very much with us celebrated this Feast in his childhood, and wanted me to keep the anniversary on this date. His name was Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger, and i had the privilege of meeting him in Paris in 1999, when he was the Archbishop. He was a Jewish Christian like me and gave me some good advice when the Project was just beginning.

I also owe a great debt to the late Risa Domb,my modern Hebrew teacher at university and who told me to never be afraid of confrontation to get to resolution. That there would be difficulties and hostility along the way but that it had to be done.

At the moment there is much JOY for which I am very grateful.

With all good wishes
Gila