Holy week is the week before Easter Sunday, it direct us to the horror and magnitude of sin, the suffering, humiliation and death of Christ, and the joyful celebrations of Palm Sunday and Easter. It is to help us truly understand the hope of Easter Sunday
Palm/Passion(to suffer in Latin) Sunday
This Sunday recalls the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem, the crowds waved palm branches and proclaimed him as the messianic king
Shrove Tuesday
"Shrove" is a term associated with confession of sins. Traditionally, in Western culture, Shrove Tuesday is a time of feasting. People feast before the fast!
Ash Wednesday
Ash is marked on the person's face usually rhe forehead in the form of a cross as a sign of penance. This is like wearing "sackcloth and ashes" in the Old Testament practice of repentance and penance. Ash is also a reminder of our mortality.
Maundy(command in Latin) Thursday
This is the day on which the Last Supper is remembered. On this day, disciples received the new commandment to love and serve one another. It is traditional for the pastor or priest to wash the feet of members of the congregation as part of the service.
Good Friday
It is the anniversary of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. It is to remember the pain and humiliation of Jesus.
Holy Saturday
The day that Jesus rested in the tomb. There is no communion served on this day. It is a day of quiet meditation as Christians contemplate the darkness of a world without a future and without hope apart from God and his grace. It is also a time to remember family and the faithful who have died as we await the resurrection, or to honour the martyrs who have given their lives for the cause of Christ in the world.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Friday, March 7, 2008
My female role model-the visionary
My female role model: Melinda French
Melinda Gates is the wife of the richest man in the world, which makes her one of the most powerful women in the world according to the Forbes business magazine (ranked 12th in 2006). Along with her husband she founded the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and continues to spend much of her time working in the organization.
She was born in Dallas Texas(1964) and grew up in a hardworking middle class family. Ray French, Melinda's dad stretched their budget to pay for all 4 children to go to college. An engineer, he started a family business on the side, operating rental properties. "That meant scrubbing floors and cleaning ovens and mowing the lawns," Melinda recalls.
Melinda received her bachelors degree in economics and computer science at the Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. She then went on to receive an MBA (Master of Business Administration) from the Duke University's Fuqua School of Business in 1987.
In the same year she also started working at Microsoft where she would meet her future husband. Melinda worked her way into the position of General Manager of Information Products. Bill and Melinda also met that year and were married on the 1st of January, 1994.
The couple started the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000 with $106 million. It has now grown to become one of the largest charitable foundations in the world. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has assets of US$37.6 billion ($52 billion), making it the world's largest. In that total is US$3.4 billion that Warren Buffet has already given. Melinda is very active in the foundation as a co-chairperson with her husband.
Melinda's responsibilities at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation involves working on strategies to pursue, promoting the issues that they seek to solve, and reviewing the results that they achieve. Bill Gates still works with Microsoft, but plans to leave the software company soon to devote all of his time to the foundation. He plans to spend more than 40 hrs a week on philanthropy, leaving 15 or so for his duties as chairman of Microsoft.
What impacts me most:
Friends of the couple say that he wouldn't be shifting gears if it weren't for Melinda. Moreover, they say, she has helped Bill become more open, patient and compassionate. "Bullshit!" he bellows. Nicer, perhaps? "No way!" he shouts, grinning because he knows it's true. One thing he admits readily: Thanks to Melinda, he is easing comfortably into his new role. About the philanthropic work, he says: "I don't think it would be fun to do on my own and I don't think I'd do as much of it." Melinda also understands people better than he does, Bill admits. In fact, he he uses her as a sounding board sometimes for personnel matters at Microsoft. In 2008, when Steve Ballmer, with whom Bill has worked for 28 years, replaced him as CEO, Melinda helped ease the awkward transition. "Melinda and I would brainstorm about it," Bill says. "You always benefit from your key confidante telling you, "You think so-and-so stepped on your toes? Well, maybe he didn't mean to. Maybe you're wrong." Warren Buffet who has known then since 1991: "Bill really needs her." Buffet also believes that Melinda makes Bill a better decision-maker. "He's smart as hell, obviously," Buffet says. "But in terms of seeing the whole picture, she's smarter."
Life was a test, and Melinda believed she had to ace it. Susan Bauer, her math and computer science teacher at Ursuline Academy, an all-girls Catholic high school in Dallas, recalls: "Everyday she had a goal." " The goals were run a mile, learn a new word, that sort of thing."
Melinda's valedictory speech, Ursuline Academy:
If you're successful, it is because somewhere, sometime, someone gave you a life or an idea that started you in the right direction. Remember also that you are indebted to life until you help some less fortunate person, just as you were helped.
Her ambition, insists Bauer, "was never abrasive. Never. She was always lovely and charming and she would win people over by being persuasive."
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation aims to improve health condition worldwide, eliminate poverty in some of the world's poorest regions, to promote education, and to provide technology to libraries.
In 2005 Time magazine chose Bill and Melinda Gates (along with U2's Bono) as Person of the Year. The magazine celebrated the charitable works that the trio were giving to the world.
Bill and Melinda Gates have three children together; Jennifer Katharine Gates born in 1996, Rory John Gates born in 1999, and Phoebe Adele Gates born in 2002.
Melinda Gates is the wife of the richest man in the world, which makes her one of the most powerful women in the world according to the Forbes business magazine (ranked 12th in 2006). Along with her husband she founded the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and continues to spend much of her time working in the organization.
She was born in Dallas Texas(1964) and grew up in a hardworking middle class family. Ray French, Melinda's dad stretched their budget to pay for all 4 children to go to college. An engineer, he started a family business on the side, operating rental properties. "That meant scrubbing floors and cleaning ovens and mowing the lawns," Melinda recalls.
Melinda received her bachelors degree in economics and computer science at the Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. She then went on to receive an MBA (Master of Business Administration) from the Duke University's Fuqua School of Business in 1987.
In the same year she also started working at Microsoft where she would meet her future husband. Melinda worked her way into the position of General Manager of Information Products. Bill and Melinda also met that year and were married on the 1st of January, 1994.
The couple started the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000 with $106 million. It has now grown to become one of the largest charitable foundations in the world. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has assets of US$37.6 billion ($52 billion), making it the world's largest. In that total is US$3.4 billion that Warren Buffet has already given. Melinda is very active in the foundation as a co-chairperson with her husband.
Melinda's responsibilities at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation involves working on strategies to pursue, promoting the issues that they seek to solve, and reviewing the results that they achieve. Bill Gates still works with Microsoft, but plans to leave the software company soon to devote all of his time to the foundation. He plans to spend more than 40 hrs a week on philanthropy, leaving 15 or so for his duties as chairman of Microsoft.
What impacts me most:
Friends of the couple say that he wouldn't be shifting gears if it weren't for Melinda. Moreover, they say, she has helped Bill become more open, patient and compassionate. "Bullshit!" he bellows. Nicer, perhaps? "No way!" he shouts, grinning because he knows it's true. One thing he admits readily: Thanks to Melinda, he is easing comfortably into his new role. About the philanthropic work, he says: "I don't think it would be fun to do on my own and I don't think I'd do as much of it." Melinda also understands people better than he does, Bill admits. In fact, he he uses her as a sounding board sometimes for personnel matters at Microsoft. In 2008, when Steve Ballmer, with whom Bill has worked for 28 years, replaced him as CEO, Melinda helped ease the awkward transition. "Melinda and I would brainstorm about it," Bill says. "You always benefit from your key confidante telling you, "You think so-and-so stepped on your toes? Well, maybe he didn't mean to. Maybe you're wrong." Warren Buffet who has known then since 1991: "Bill really needs her." Buffet also believes that Melinda makes Bill a better decision-maker. "He's smart as hell, obviously," Buffet says. "But in terms of seeing the whole picture, she's smarter."
Life was a test, and Melinda believed she had to ace it. Susan Bauer, her math and computer science teacher at Ursuline Academy, an all-girls Catholic high school in Dallas, recalls: "Everyday she had a goal." " The goals were run a mile, learn a new word, that sort of thing."
Melinda's valedictory speech, Ursuline Academy:
If you're successful, it is because somewhere, sometime, someone gave you a life or an idea that started you in the right direction. Remember also that you are indebted to life until you help some less fortunate person, just as you were helped.
Her ambition, insists Bauer, "was never abrasive. Never. She was always lovely and charming and she would win people over by being persuasive."
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation aims to improve health condition worldwide, eliminate poverty in some of the world's poorest regions, to promote education, and to provide technology to libraries.
In 2005 Time magazine chose Bill and Melinda Gates (along with U2's Bono) as Person of the Year. The magazine celebrated the charitable works that the trio were giving to the world.
Bill and Melinda Gates have three children together; Jennifer Katharine Gates born in 1996, Rory John Gates born in 1999, and Phoebe Adele Gates born in 2002.
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