Editor, RE: “Why it is more blessed to give than to receive” (Sunday Times, June, 19). What could have been more enlightening on a Sunday morning, while sipping a refreshing cup of Rwandan tea, not in far away Mumbai, but right here in Kigali, in the peace and comfort of the luxurious Grand Legacy Hotel, than reading the interesting article? While we prepare to bring down the curtain on Kwibuka22 in a couple of weeks, this story of helping those in need, is most appropriate. Rwandan youth in Mumbai sang, during Kwibuka22, a most meaningful hymn of St. Francis, which was in keeping with this time of remembrance, in keeping with what is mentioned in your article and which I would like to share with your readers: ‘Make me a channel of your peace,Where there is hatred let me bring your loveWhere there is injury your pardon LordAnd where there’s doubt true faith in You. O Master grant that I may never seek, so much to be consoled as to consoleTo be understood as to understand ,to be loved as to love with all my soul. Make me a channel of your peaceWhere there’s despair in life, let me bring hopeWhere there is darkness, only lightAnd where there’s sadness , ever joy. Make me a channel of your peaceIt is in pardoning that we are pardonedIn giving to all men that we receiveAnd in dying that we are born to eternal life.’ It is, therefore, as the writer very rightly mentioned, far more blessed to give than to receive and this is reflected so well in Rwandan youth, whether it is Immaculee Iribagiza in the United States of America, Harriet Ingabire of Red Rocks, Musanze, or even Kellya Uwiragiye, the founder of ‘Media for the Deaf’, right here in Kigali.We can see how people, and particularly the youth of this New and Remarkable Rwanda, constantly strive to inspire the world. Clarence Fernandes
