Light-nucleus of Figueira in Sao Paulo supports young mothers in Carapicuiba

On last June 8, eight volunteers of the Light-Nucleus of Figueira in São Paulo, affiliated with Fraternidade – International Humanitarian Federation,  gathered for the quarterly meeting with mothers and children of the community of Jardim Tonato in Carapicuiba, a town of the metropolitan region of Sao Paulo. Volunteers of the Sector of Service and of the Sector of Health and Healing of the Light-Nucleus, located in that town, have been active for some years in the community.

For the children, it is always a morning of games and learnings. For the mothers, many of them young or single, it is an opportunity to talk or to share the difficulties of their daily life. In a round of talk topics for discussion and reflection are proposed and the questions brought by the mothers are taken into account, while the children are entertained with another group of volunteers.

On that Saturday, ten mothers and 24 children attended the meeting, organized by the Children Pastoral. With lightness and good humor, the group could talk about difficulties of relationship of the mothers, insecurity in the setting of limits to children and youths, the challenges of the mothers who work out and of children who, in the absence of the mother, began to look after their younger brothers and sisters. “I was eight years old and look after my seven brothers and sisters”, was one of the testimonies about this issue.

DREAM BANK

Denise Mendes Gomes, family therapist, raised some reflections: “When we learn since we are a child to look after siblings, sometimes we do not learn anything else in life, and we later need our own children in order to keep looking after someone. But we also need to have other learnings, not only learning to look after, but to have another objective in life”. To learn a job, in her opinion, could be a goal for the youths who today only life family life.

Encoraged by the talk, the young mother Roberta Conceição de Souza shared that she wants to be a doctor, but she interrupted her high school to look after her now two-and-a-half-year-old daughter. To envisage stages, such as first to conclude a high-school equivalency course, is a path, continues Denise. “And if we know what are the dreams of youths, we can think what courses are missing in the community and what to do to take these youths to these courses”.

To learn computer sciences, to find a job to finance a graduation course, and also to simplify the goal and consider other options of professionalizing courses in the health sector were some of the suggestions to help Roberta visualize a dream come true in her future.

STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS

The Light-Nucleus of Figueira in Sao Paulo, a meeting point of the eight groups of the Light-Network of the metropolitan region and of the twelve inland and coastal groups of the state of Sao Paulo, has been expanding its activity since 2017, in a new cycle of service outside its gates.

Formal and informal partnerships of the Light-Nucleus with entities and non-governmental organizations that are well organized in the social field have allowed not only to expand service to society, but also strengthen and motivate even more the volunteers for the renewal and expansion of perspectives of group actions.

A recent contact with the Kolping Association, which works globally and carries out programs in Brazil for overcoming hunger and poverty by means of formation and work, will be invaluable in the indication of formation courses, helping the concretion of dreams of youths such as Roberta.

“Besides the formation of youths for new activities, it would also be important to take the slightly older children, ten or eleven years old, to know the local networks that offer courses and activities of drama, arts and sports, for them to be able to expand their horizons and enrich their lives”, suggested the educator Maria do Carmo Perrucci.

GREAT CHALLENGES AND SMALL VICTORIES

There are challenges also for the five volunteers from the Children Pastoral present, who, at the closing of the meeting on that Saturday, shared not only their joy for the morning work, but also their difficulties to deal with their own limitations in the accompaniment of the countless families attended by the Pastoral. “I never give up only because of my love for children”, stated the Children Pastoral leader, Marlene Mendes de Oliveira.

In times of few people offering to serve, concluded Claudia Rimini, of the Sector of Service of the Light-Nucleus, it is fundamental to have union of people and organizations in the same task, for the strengthening of all. “We know it is difficult. For all. But United, we can be very strong”.

In that morning, the common feeling was that of a great step taken. According to the therapist Adriana Broncher, of the Sector Health and Healing, “The mothers were open and participated as they had not done for a long time, and in this way the life of these people can change, with small things that touch their consciousnesses”.