Day: June 20, 2008

My cousins Mitch and Kyle encouraged me to check out the football championships going on in Europe.  I have to admit, after catching the last 10 minutes of the Croatia vs. Turkey battle, I am hooked (of course I didn’t see the 119 scoreless minutes preceding those last ten)!

After 119 minutes without any goals, Croatia scored!  Then less than a minute or so later with the final whistle about to blow any second, Turkey scored!  Then the match moved to penalty kicks.  Remarkably for the third time in a row, Turkey came from behind to win.

TURKEY’S RUSTU

Even more remarkably, they won with a back up goalkeeper who was replacing the starter who is serving a two game suspension.  Rustu won me over the way he warmly encouraged the Croatians just before the penalty kicks and just after the match ended.

The irony isn’t lost on me that the day after posting “Avoiding Being Super-Sized,” I am posting a reminder that today is World Refugee Day. As we struggle to stop eating more than we should, many struggle to even eat at all. I always think of the passage from Genesis 12:1-3 in which God blesses Abram to be a blessing to the nations and the phrase from the New Testament: “To much is given, much is required.”

According to the United Nations, by the end of 2007, there were more than 11 million refugees worldwide and 26 million internally displaced people.

Another important statistic: The world population will grow to 7 billion by 2012.

Finally, China, India, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh, Iraq, Kenya, Russia, Sudan and Europe have been identified as among the worst violators of refugees’ rights in a global survey.