Garden Blessings

Saturday it was time for the annual blessing of the Fourth Street Gardens.  These gardens are the result of  a collaboration between a private owner, neighborhood churches, the families in the neighborhood and other organizations that donate money and resources for tools and seeds.

Most of the families who garden these plots are refugees from Burma.

These families have escaped war and persecution to come to the Midwest.  The bravery they display in learning a new language, a new culture a new place inspires me.

Despite all of the obstacles, these families cling tight to each other with multiple generations living and gardening together.

I can't imagine the desperate circumstances that drive whole families from the communities they love into the void of the larger world. They leave what they've known their whole lives, the people and community that have supported them; not knowing what the future will hold.

We are a country of immigrants, a melting pot of cultures and religions. The immigrants I know come here to secure their family's future for the economic, religious and cultural freedoms the United States offers.  Sometimes our ideas about "how things should be" clash with the newcomers.  These tensions have ever been with the United States. They are not new, not different, just the process of growing.

Here in the Midwest as our small towns and mid-size cities shrink we need more families who will sink down roots, invest in our community, make it a community that thrives.

These are the hopeful, industrious members of our community who are taking a vacant lot in a neighborhood where gun violence is not uncommon, turning the soil,

digging deep, planting roots

and building a better community and future for all of our children.

These newest members of our community are getting a good start as the folks who are already here make investments in our newest residents.

Councilman Steve Schmitt, on the far right, who works hard every year to secure donations to make sure the garden is tilled, everyone has tools, seeds and plants to launch their gardens. Dave O'Malley, center who along with his wife, Liz, donates the lot each year.

Carol Luce, center, from Blessed Maria Assunta Pallata Middle School 7th Grade Service Learning class, who asks her students how they want to change the world.

 Two of Carol's Burmese students, Sie Se Lia an Nae Meh inspired their classmates to raise money to provide shovels and rakes for the gardens.

In spite of the harsh rhetoric that's been coming from some of in our political class, this simple task of standing together and reminding ourselves that we are all God's children, put here to take care of each other and the planet because after all it's in all of our best interest for everyone to have shelter, food, security.

As Pastor Nate, seen here in pink shorts, says all of the world is God's garden.

Build houses and live in them; and plant gardens and eat their produce.

Jeremiah 29:5

Thank you to all of those who make these gardens possible every year:

Church Row Neighborhood Gardens Thank You to:

Dave and Liz O’Malley (4 th Street) and Habitat for Humanity (Sunnyside Ave) for the land for the gardens

Blessed Maria Assunta Pallata Middle School 7 th Grade Service Learning class and Carol Luce

Iowa State Extension and Justin Edwards

PDCM Insurance

Hawkeye Community College and Dan Lichty

Black Hawk County and Supervisor John Miller

City of Waterloo Leisure Services and Paul Huting

Blue Zones Project

Cole Photography

UNI Center for Energy, Environment and Education

Fareway Grocery store on San Marnan

Cedar Valley Good Foods Network

Lowe’s Home Improvement Center

Father Ken and Father Luigi from Sacred Heart Church

Pastor Nate from First United Methodist Church