On January 27th the Women’s Federation for World Peace (WFWP) of Southern California held its annual "New Year’s Tea" to conclude the year 2007 and to usher in the new year of 2008.

The event took place in La Canada Flintridge Country Club, nestled on a hillside and overlooking beautiful scenery. This event was scheduled from 2-4pm. Just about 2 hours before the event started, the heavens opened up and poured down a shower of heavy blessed rain. Given this deluge, many of the organizing members were worried about cancellations.

We had confirmed 60 servings with the Country Club. However, despite the heavy rain, 65 people attended. Among them was Mrs. Erikawa, senior vice president of WFWP USA, who flew from New York specifically to support this event. Also, we had three guests from Las Vegas and two sisters from San Diego.

During the heavy rain, Claudelina Smith, our chairwoman, prayed to God and asked Him to show a rainbow as a sign of blessing. Indeed, a beautiful rainbow appeared in the sky at the end of the event and made everyone happy. The program began with welcoming remarks from Claudelina Smith, followed by an Invocation given by Mrs. Anna Woods.

Kimiyo Anceney, our new national vice president in charge of membership, then reported on the 8th International WFWP Leadership conference held in South Korea. Seven hundred women from 50 nations participated in this conference. They made an historical trip to North Korea and met North Korean women leaders. Kimiyo also reviewed the 15th Anniversary Celebration and Benefit for the Schools of Africa. This event hosted by WFWP Southern California last October made a $10,000 donation for the Schools of Africa project.

Era Thompson then gave a report on local monthly meetings we had during the year 2007, centered on the theme "Empowering Women as Peace Makers."

After the reports, the participants enjoyed "High Tea" -- tea served with individual teapots, small sandwiches, petites fours and fruit. While enjoying the food and each others’ company, our 16 year old 2nd gen, Laura Nomoto, blessed our gathering with her beautiful performance of the "Impossible Dream". After this short break, Dawna Tully read True Mother’s keynote speech, first given at the 10th Anniversary of WFWP. This speech outlines clearly the future direction of WFWP. As it did 5 years ago, this speech moved the hearts of the audience and raised the whole tone of our gathering.

Next, an overview of WFWP’s international, national and our local plans and goals was presented for the year 2008. Our local focus is to develop our monthly meetings and increase our membership to 3,000 nationally. We also mentioned the new "Pink Piggy Bank Project" to support the schools of Africa. We collected piggy banks at this event and made almost $700 from 33 piggy banks.

We asked participants to write about their meetings and a local service project we can be involved with. Towards the end of the program, our sister Katrin McCarthy gave a tearful and moving testimony about her relationship with her Bridge of Peace Ceremony sister, Elizabeth Little, who had passed away recently. We then concluded our event with the song "Let there be Peace on Earth".

As a result of this event, we signed up 5 new members. One of these new members committed to a $30 monthly membership; also, one renewal was upgraded from $50-a-year friendship level to $20 monthly support. This result made us confident that we will increase our membership if we can establish inspiring and consistent monthly meetings. In this way, we can surely build a strong WFWP organization upon which True Mother can stand.

The rainbow that appeared in the sky at the end of our event brought forth a joyful shout from all participants, and assured us that God’s Heart and Blessing were with WFWP.