The Saint Monica’s Home of the Augustinian Recollects in Fortaleza (Ceará, Brazil) is a project that fights against exploitation, abuse, abandonment, school drop-out or any type of violence against underage girls and adolescents from neighborhoods, families and more vulnerable.
On the 27th of August a space was born which evoked Saint Augustine and his way of understanding the human person. It especially evoked his mother, St. Monica, protector in her time of her son St. Augustine and now of the young girls who needed companionship, affection, and hopes for the future. It is a fight for justice, and equal opportunities, in which they will be given rights, and become participants and protagonists of their own life projects.
Saint Augustine was a man of great knowledge. The Augustinian Recollects made a proposal which put first education as opposed to assisted paternalism. It also made important self-conviction as opposed to obligatory reclusion, the search for one’s self as opposed to the loss of self-respect, and the construction of fraternity as opposed to the use and abuse of others. Also, the Augustinian Recollects did not feel or want to be alone. They believe in the importance of working together in groups and with other institutions, combining efforts. And they work together with all the institutions present in Ceara Cove and in the CEU.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
- Introduction
- 1. One dollar and a half: a Passport to immunity
- 2. The origin of Saint Monica’s Home
- 3. A project with principles
- 4. A Project in communion
- 5. The dynamics of injustice
- 6. Sexual tourism and the under-age
- 7. Who has access to Saint Monica’s Home?
- 8. A project with objectives
- 9. Methodology, Evaluation, Planning
