Jerusalem at the 2012 ELCA Youth Gathering: Time for Blessings and Crazy Hair

The Gathering is approaching quickly. We have been having lots of fun preparing! During Vacation Bible School, the youth shared presentations on ELCA World Hunger, the Malaria Campaign, the 100 Wells Challenge, and the Million Books Project. We challenged the Vacation Bible School kids to raise $100 to be split amongst these four ministries at the Gathering. If we reached our goal, the youth and adults going to the Gathering would have their hair spray painted crazy colors. By Tuesday Night we had collected $100. So, we upped our goal. If we raised $200, the youth would have colorful hair on Sunday as well as crazy face paint. And we reached that goal too! Thanks be to God!
On Thursday, our group met to prepare for our Cultural Literacy Practice Justice project. We watched Slumdog Millionaire and had a discussion about how cultures interact with one another and affect our lives. That day, we also made our banner for the Superdome and counted how much money was donated in our Giant Piggy Bank.

Lots of crazy hair

On Sunday, we shared in a Blessing of our group. During the Litany of blessing, each participant received a Citizens with the Saints collapsible water bottle and Mapdannas. We presented a T-shirt to shareholder Sue Johnson who made a huge contribution to our fundraising efforts by donating her pay as musician to our trip Thank you to the congregation for your support prayers, and excitement!