Wing: Service
Weekly Soup Project
n earlier 2016, the Indo-Canadian Christian Fellowship group members from Saskatoon approached the Sai Centre to help them in an ongoing service activity. We were approached saying “You SAI folks do service activities and wondering whether your group would be interested in a hands-on service that we like to add to an ongoing project”. The event was described as below by the group.
Youth Sandwich Project Initiative for Local Food Shelters
The Sandwich Project drive started as a small initiative to serve the homeless in Toronto. Initially, sandwiches were hand delivered to the homeless brothers/sisters personally. The drive was done in response to the growing population that are without food. Later, it was inculcated within the SSE class to inspire young children and promote civic engagement.
“Melody of Divine Love” – Musical program for Senior’s Home
Monthly performance for Residents of Erin Meadow Retirement home.
Siloam Mission Service
The Winnipeg Sai Centre has been carrying out this service activity for several years, both initiated and sustained by two devotees at the Sai Centre.. The service is held once a month on every Saturday. The task is to cook and serve a warm meal at the Siloam mission. In general, the cooking is carried out in the morning over a three hour period. Typically, the devotees prepare macaroni and cheese, mixed vegetables, and beans. The items are stored in an oven until they are served at noon. Siloam provides additional items such as bread or buns, salad and dessert to the menu. This makes for a full warm and sumptuous meal for the under-privileged who frequent the mission.
Harvest Service
The Winnipeg Harvest service activity is on every Wednesday of the week and takes place in the basement of the Sai Centre. It starts with the receipt of food sent to the Centre by truck. The window of receiving can vary between 12 to 1:30 pm. It is quite challenging to receive and unload the food items as they have to be transported to the basement. We generally have a group of three volunteers, especially retired devotees, to carry out this activity. Once the food is received and arranged on the tables, this group of volunteers leave.
Father’s Day Prayers & Bhajan organized by the Ladies Wing
The Cooksville Sai Centre Ladies Wing organized Father’s Day prayers to emphasize the importance of honouring fathers and parents.
“Melody of Divine Love” – Musical program for Senior’s Home
This month the Melody of Divine Love group performed on Sunday, July 22, 2018. The theme for the month was “Celebrate Canada”.
We chose to celebrate Canada Day with the residents of Erin Meadows Retirement Home in the month of July. Despite the month of July being one when most children are away on vacation, the Cooksville Centre, with Swami’s abundant Grace was successful in putting together a wonderful performance with a limited number of children.
Meals on wheels
The Meals on Wheels is an energetic drive that was conducted at the Sri Sathya Sai Centre Mississauga- Central on 25th March. There were 11 volunteers who helped in packing 81 lunch boxes of salad, pasta and roasted potatoes. Sai Ragavan, the service coordinator of the Sri Sathya Sai Centre Mississauga- Central emphasized that the drive is an awareness program to remind us all to share food with those who do not have access to regular meals.
Christmas Carolling
On Sunday December 17th, 2017, SSE students of all ages, young adults, and several adults of the Sai Centre presented a joint Christmas program at the CLSHD Herron Seniors Home. This is the second Christmas program at the senior’s home. The home was introduced to the Sai Centre through a devotee who worked there during her internship as a caregiver. She introduced the Sai Centre and the SSIO to the Activity Director who was happily welcomed the event.
Tree Planting
Sri Sathya Sai Baba Centre of Cooksville participated in an annual Tree Planting event in partnership with the City of Mississauga. This took place on Saturday, September 23rd at 2:00pm at Aquinas Park in Mississauga. The day was also the hottest weekend of this year’s summer season. Despite the heat warning issued by the city, enthusiastic volunteers showed their commitment to Swami, in the spirit of service and love of the environment by reporting on time at the site along with members of their families.