Charity Concert – Arusha Scholarship Fund and Cairdeas

Dolce will be performing this Friday 19th February at a charity concert in aid of Arusha Scholarship Fund and Cairdeas, in Corpus Christi Church, Home Farm Road, starting time: 8pm. Tickets are €10 and are available at the door. We will be joined by our friends, the Newbridge Gospel Choir for what we expect to be a highly entertaining evening. Here is some background into these two very deserving causes:

• Cairdeas: A Homeless Action Group formed entirely by volunteers. Every Monday and Friday they are out in Grafton Street helping the homeless in a personalised way, providing home cooked meals, sleeping bags and clothing, but more importantly giving them support  by listening to their problems and giving them information and advice.They also support families in emergency accommodation and those in need. Cairdeas was invited last year to Áras an Uachtaráin by the President of Ireland on St Patrick’s day and Lynn Cahill, its founder, received the Local Hero Award at the Pride of Ireland Award ceremony for her altruistic service to the community.
• Arusha Scholarship Fund: The Corpus Christi Arusha Scholarship Fund was set up during the summer of 2008.  Fr. King (was the Corpus Christi Parish Priest at the time) asked a number of parishioners to get involved with the fund after he had visited a fellow priest in Arusha, Tanzania. Fr. Mike O’Shea is a priest from the Pallottine Community, he has been in Tanzania for a number of years. When Fr. King visited Fr. Mike in 2008 he was taken aback at the poverty in the townland known as Arusha. There are c. 50,000 people in this community. Fr. King wondered if there was something our parish of Corpus Christi could do to help the people of Arusha. He suggested setting up an education fund to support the children of the Arusha. In Tanzania primary education is provided by the State, although there can be up to 100 children in a classroom, but secondary education is not. All of the secondary schools are fee paying and children who cannot afford these fees cease their education after primary level. A group of parishioners met, we decided that realistically we could raise €10,000 per annum towards providing secondary level education for these children. In the first year 2009 the fund paid for fees for 56 kids. The fund provides education for c. 50-60 students each year since then. These students are selected by the elders of each community, mainly Muslim and Christian. We try to ensure that there is a gender balance for those receiving the gift of education 50/50 male and female. The students have to pass an English exam to get a scholarship as the secondary education is taught through English and is based on the UK examination system, i.e. O-Levels and A-Levels. There are also some students who will attend technical colleges to become electricians, mechanics etc. We fundraise mainly in the Parish. We have in the past run quizzes, flower demonstrations, dinner nights, talks, theatre nights, concerts. We have two collections in Corpus Christi Church each year and we have an annual coffee morning in the grounds of the Church on one of these collection days. In recent years it has become more and more difficult to raise these funds as parishioners prefer to donate to charities much closer to home.We are thrilled to be given this opportunity to raise funds for our charity with the help of the Dolce and the Newbridge Gospel singer’s concert and really appreciate that Dolce thought about us as one of their charity options.