Plant A Tree For Charity

Nowadays, green living has been a practice for most of us. Trees gives us shelter and beautifies Mother Earth. On Sept. 9-10, 2011, I will be holding a charity plant sale at my house in West Chicago. Proceeds will go toward defraying some of the above costs to underwrite the Global Bag Project. For more info, contact me at info@hungrysouls.org or leave a message on the office phone,630-293-4500. Any volunteer help the proceeding week or that weekend will be greatly appreciated.

Kingdom Tales

David & Karen Mains' Kingdom Tales consist of three volumes - Tales of the Kingdom, Tales of the Resistance, and Tales of the Restoration.

Each volume consists of twelve fantasy short stories, set in a city ruled by an evil Enchanter who has usurped the throne from the true King. The stories are all separate events often involving different characters, but are bound together as part of a larger story as the Enchanted City is rescued by the exiled King and becomes the Bright City, leading to a joyous conclusion as the people of Great Park and Bright City begin the Great Celebration at the conclusion of the Restoration.

The stories in the Kingdom Tales are heartwarming allegories of good and evil that draw the readers into the Kingdom through the open doors of whimsy and invention.

Face of Christ

Friends and Strangers written by Karen Mains contain true stories that make up milestones in the author's journey from isolation to community -- from haunting estrangement to a deeper, more vital connection with others. Karen Mains has discovered, that we grow into our real selves. And it is often those we meet in life's lonely places that show us the face of Christ.

Torschlusspanik: Gate-closing Panic

“It’s not so much a fear of diminishing opportunities that haunts me, as the fear of not finishing well. Of course, none of us knows the date or hour of our own demise, but I can’t think of anything more satisfactory than to rest my head, take a deep breath, and sigh, It is finished. How wonderful that would be.“

Read here as Karen Mains ponders on her torschlusspanik.

Note: torschlusspanik is a German word which means "the fear that time is running out."

Winner of the 1982 Christopher Award

The Fragile Curtain was written after author Karen Mains trips through barrios and refugee camps in Central America, Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Africa in the late '70s to early '80s. In this deeply moving book, Karen Mains recounts her very personal journey through the crowded refugee camps of the world. She went to write about the pain and suffering of these people. Instead they showed her the meaning of her own life. The sacredness of family. The miracle of love. The hope of birth and death.

The Fragile Curtain went on to win the Christopher Award in 1982, an award that salutes media that "affirms the highest values of the human spirit."

Friends and Strangers by Karen Mains

Friends and Strangers is a collection of essays Karen Mains wrote when she first began to recognize the divine interplay that often occurred when meeting strangers. Some of the chapter titles include “The Loneliest Man I Ever Met,” “Guess Who Came to St. Patrick’s Day Dinner?”, “Writer Without Words,” and “A Comfortably Rumpled Advocate.”

Close Encounters of the Casual Kind

by Karen Mains

For my birthday last week, David and I used our Metro Regional Transportation Authority “Seniors Ride Free” passes to go into Chicago. Rumor has it that the state legislature is going to cancel this program since Illinois is facing one of the worst budget deficits among the 50 states so we are trying to employ these passes as much as possible before the hatchet falls.

Last spring, because of the fact that Riccardo Mutti was named the new artistic director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, my husband purchased a series of tickets, which are serving as our anniversary, Christmas, birthday, and Valentine’s Day gifts. We arrived at Ogilvie Station on January 19, where a bitter biting wind forced us to catch a taxi. Consequently, we had an hour to spend in the Art Institute (where the Chagall stained-glass windows have been cleaned and reinstalled) before our dinner reservation. At 6 p.m. we hustled across Michigan Avenue to have dinner at the Russian Tea Time Restaurant.

How to choose from Ukrainian Borscht, Eggplant/Zucchini Duet, Lamb Samsa or Pumpkin Vareniky? David leaned over to the woman eating alone at the table beside ours and asked, “Do you have anything on the menu you especially enjoy?” That was the beginning of an enchanting table conversation with this woman who had grown up on the South Side of Chicago, spent her career teaching at South Shore High School, resides now in retirement at the family home in Saugatauk, Michigan, but makes regular trips back into the city where she keeps a condo in her old neighborhood. Read full article at Hungry Souls.