It’s early afternoon as I write you – a day much like any other day at Mercy.

When you visit a shack where poor children live, you'll find that they have next to nothing they can call their own: no toys, no books, not even a mattress to sleep on. Worst of all for the poorest of these children, they have no chance to go to school.

Following the floods that inundated Bangkok this past October, we initiated a comprehensive emergency relief campaign in several slum communities. With support from friends around the world, we were able to reach out to thousands of the poorest of the poor in desperate need, providing emergency assistance, food, lodging (in our preschools), and home repairs.

On January 26, 2012, The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) of Thailand gave recognition to Fr. Joe and six other fighters for equality at its annual awards ceremony, held here in Bangkok.

Our children celebrated Children’s Day this Saturday in perfect fashion – playing hard, eating ice cream and cake, swimming at local pools, roughhousing (pretending to be kung fu fighters), skipping rope, jumping and diving and cart-wheeling all around, and then, as the sun went down, finding even more ways to play harder and have even more fun.

Tomorrow is our favorite day of the year in Thailand.

It’s Children’s Day!