This is the fifteenth year that Bay Area Mennonite churches have
sponsored an International Gift Faire, a unique opportunity for
local residents to make an impact on world poverty while learning
more about folk arts of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. It will be
held tomorrow at Lincoln Glen Church Fellowship Hall, 2700 Booksin
Avenue, San Jose from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
This is the fifteenth year that Bay Area Mennonite churches have sponsored an International Gift Faire, a unique opportunity for local residents to make an impact on world poverty while learning more about folk arts of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. It will be held tomorrow at Lincoln Glen Church Fellowship Hall, 2700 Booksin Avenue, San Jose from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The International Gift Faire features hundreds of unique handmade crafts like baskets, ornaments, musical instruments, toys, rugs, and brassware from developing countries such a Bangladesh, El Salvador, Thailand and the Philippines. New for this year is a selection of “fairly traded gourmet coffee.“
These handicrafts are imported by Ten Thousand Villages, a nonprofit marketing and job creation program of the Mennonite Central Committee. Its mission is to create economic opportunities that help people help themselves. Last year Ten Thousand Villages aided over 60,000 crafts people in more than 30 countries, enabling them to afford improved health care, nutrition, housing, and education.
All proceeds from the Gift Faire are donated to Ten Thousand Villages which allows the purchase of more crafts from an increasing number of poor people. More than 200 volunteers operate the San Jose Faire, including students from a world hunger class at San Jose State University, which helps to eliminate the exploitative profits of middlemen. Last year shoppers from Hollister to Palo Alto helped earn more than $60,000 for Ten Thousand Villages.
For more information call 264-1662 or check the Internet at www.internationalgiftfaire.com.
The Mennonites trace their origin to Anabaptism, a Reformation movement begun in Switzerland in the sixteenth century. The Anabaptists were persecuted by both Roman Catholics and other Protestants because of their distinctive beliefs: only adults could be baptized; they refused to take oaths of allegiance to governments, accepted only the Bible as authority, and refused to serve in the military.
Among the religious groups today which are descended from the Anabaptists are the Huttites, Amish, and Mennonites (the largest group, named for Dutch Catholic priest Menno Simons who converted to the Anabaptist faith and helped lead it to prominence). Today there are about a half-million members of these groups in the U.S., about a million world-wide.
A notable part of their faith relates to serving others. This is especially apparent in the functioning of the Mennonite Disaster Service. Mennonites have always helped each other: the famous barn-raising scene in the Harrison Ford movie “Witness” (although featuring Amish) is a good example, symbolizing “the love of Christ and the advantages of mutual community helpfulness.”
But in the in 1950’s the Mennonites began to further organize and expand this mutual aid beyond their own membership. As a people of peace opposed to military participation, the Mennonites find disaster relief an another opportunity to serve the nation as a whole. Each year more than 3,000 volunteers participate in post-disaster cleanup and repairs, at no charge to victims.
Another example of this effort is an Economic Development Agency which loans money at extremely low interest rates to set up cottage industries, again helping poor people become self-reliant.
Chuck Flagg teaches English at Mt. Madonna High School in Gilroy. He lives in Morgan Hill with his wife and two sons. Write him at The Times, 30 E. Third St., Morgan Hill, 95037.
