“Rabo de Peixe Sabe Sonhar” (Rabo de Peixe can dream) is a project of the Society of Jesus with which we, the Handmaids of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, have been collaborating since its beginning in 2004.
This project includes a summer camp which enjoys the support of a group of volunteers from the university centres run by the Society of Jesus and its beneficiaries are around 100 children – aged 6 to 16 years – from the village of Rabo de Peixe.
Rabo de Peixe is located about 25 km from Ponta Delgada -the administrative capital of the island of S. Miguel, in the Azores.
It is one of the poorest regions of Portugal. A great deal of its eight thousand inhabitants lives in real poverty. Alcohol addiction, hunger, domestic violence, and school failure mark the daily life of these families, children and youth. It is therefore a reality that calls us and commits us each year, since 2004.
It is the life of the children and their families that gives life to this project and keeps encouraging this team of lay people, Jesuits, and Handmaids. We are driven by the deep and sincere conviction that we cannot live well while living in the comfort of our own lives and ignore the ones who live at the margin of the meaning of existence, at the margin of the possibility to have a dignified life.
The project “Rabo de Peixe Sabe Sonhar” hopes to be an opportunity, a lever in the life of each child and young person from this small and forgotten village on the island of S. Miguel. And by feeling loved and taken care of, they can experience the possibility of dreaming of a better future.