St. Mary's - June 2006 Newsletter

Pakistan Concert Raises Record $6,000

By Mary Donovan

The survivors of the October 8, 2005 earthquake in Pakistan have an able sympathizer in Gina Kuravilla. She’s the woman who ran the very successful benefit concert which enabled the parish to send $6,000 to help. Six thousand dollars at $5 a ticket? That’s a tribute to the concern of Shrewsbury people and to the talents of Gina as an impresario.

This year’s concert was even bigger and better than Gina’s 2005 well-received benefit concert to aid the people in Darfur. Gina is a whirlwind. The week of the concert was the week of final exams in three courses for her. She is studying at Anna Maria College to obtain a Master’s Degree in Pastoral Ministry.

It was nothing, she said, with a hand gesture that brushed away any idea that she couldn’t handle both, especially with the motivation she has.

``It was a way of saying thank you to God for living in this country, for the fact that my children are in good health,’’ she said.

Gina is very conscious of the statistics of the earthquake. There were an estimated 3.3 million homeless. Conservative estimates place the dead at 73,000.

``Kids went to school in the morning,’’ she said, ``thirty-five thousand did not return home again.’’ The enormity of the numbers touched her heart, she said. ``If we lined up all the body bags, where would it stretch?’’ she said.

Gina had been in India at the time of the earthquake. She was attending her mother’s funeral. They felt the earthquake in New Delhi, she said. On the way to church they were startled by unusually large flocks of birds rising into the sky.

When she returned to the U.S. later in October, she read reports of people without homes. She saw news about the work of Doctors without Borders in the earthquake region. She thought to help a people who, because of the accident of birth were in a part of the world that was devastated by disaster..

``The emphasis is on justice more than charity,’’ she said.

She recruited help with a wonderful response. The whole parish became involved: social justice, hospitality, art and environment, school families, nurse ministry. youth ministry, high school kids, children’s chorus. communication team, parish council, people who work in the parish and the priests.

It was a whole-hearted effort under an able leader. The concert provided a benefit to the cause and a benefit to the leader herself.

``The best thing about that night was that I really understood the concept of what it is to be all one family - all God’s children,’’ she said. ``There were no barriers, she said, `no brown or white, no men or women, no old or young.’’