My fond memories of ‘Kindness’

Mary Rose Bacani Valenti

November 18, 2008
kindnesscollage2.jpgThis week on The World I Know we look at Kindness.
In the first segment of this show, Rachel DeSa introduces us to Kindness and how it is lived in the school community. A grade five student at Guardian Angels school in the Toronto area at the time, she had Kindness written on her face. She had to be the host! I remember during her interview, her classmates listening in said that she was a great singer. So for fun I asked her to sing a song into the mic. And she did! What a voice, and what a spirit! She had a sheepish smile when she finished, as if waiting to be both made fun of and applauded, but of course no one laughed and everyone applauded. She even said, “Oh gosh, there are other people in this class who sing really well, too!” Now, Rachel’s class can be considered as the “star” of this first segment. Her class is active in anything that offers help to people. This segment took me “out of the box” in the sense that we ended up doing a little bit of filming at Sick Kids Hospital in downtown Toronto. Find out why!
kindnesscollage3.jpgThe student of the day is Mimi Pukulakatt. Bright and articulate with smiling dark eyes, Mimi exudes confidence. But she says outright that she finds it hard to pray, and raises up her peers who are courageous enough to invite others to pray in public. For her, kindness is not always about big actions – it can start with a prayer.
The saint of the day is St. Elizabeth of Hungary. Fr. Robert Mignella, Associate Pastor at St. Clare of Assisi Parish in Woodbridge, talks about his devotion to St. Elizabeth. He was a university student at the Newman Center in Toronto listening to a homily by Fr. Thomas Rosica on St. Elizabeth. There were St. Elizabeth Health Care workers present at the Mass in honour of St. Elizabeth and Fr. Rosica went on to talk about her virtues: she was a queen, a woman of prestige and reputation, but her biggest desire was to serve the poor. This resounded with Fr. Robert because at the time he was struggling with wanting to be popular and prestigious, but here was someone who wanted to be lowly instead.
The “Kindness” episode airs Tuesday, November 18th, the fifth episode of Salt + Light’s newest series, The World I Know: Virtues in Action. For more information on this series, check the Virtues webpage by clicking HERE. And remember, if you miss the 8 pm ET broadcast, you can still catch it at midnight, or during your lunch break (12:30 pm ET) the next day via live streaming!