Sisters of St. Alma

Some students, a sister of St. Alma's, and the requisite Asian peace sign.

In Malang there is one permanent mission couple, an Elder and Sister Halverson that have been serving here for the last eighteen months. While technically proselyting missionaries, they don't know the language, so a lot of their service has been in befriending neighbours or organizing branch projects, camps, and activites---plus teaching five English classes a week at Bhakti Luhur, a school/orphanage/rehabilitation center of sorts run by the Catholic Sisters of St. Alma's here in Malang. At Bhakti Luhur they take in all the discarded, the unwanted, the unclaimed; a haven for disabled children from birth to adulthood. The Halversons have worked miracles within the foundation and yesterday let us in on a little bit of the magic---as the Halversons head home next week, they held one final farewell bash at their club house pool for all their students, plus the nuns. End result? An all-out afternoon of the unexpected, exhilarating, and eternal.

photo above right: President Iwan (District Pres, Jawa Timor [East Java])
with Anita, who has no hands and only one functioning leg.
He taught her to swim that day.

:::Email Excerpt:::
Have I told you yet that, once a week on Tuesday afternoons, we teach English to the nuns of St. Alma at Bhakti Lehur? I love it, from simply being able to teach English right down to the very idea of it---we Sisters in our name tags sitting across from the Sisters in their wimples. And they themselves are a sight to behold, the lives they live and the how they live it. Yesterday Sisters Cecilia and Valentine invited us over for lunch after the lesson, a little plate of nasi kuning and ayam goreng on a simple table in a sparse room of their dormitory. I am glad for them; for their company, their goodness, their sacrifice. Plus, they pray! They read---and study---the scriptures! They center their lives on Christ. It is humbling and uplifting and hopeful to see.