Missions & Social Justice
CHARITY:WATER
It’s hard not to think about water today. In the western world, we face growing concerns about our stewardship of the world’s most precious resource. There’s talk of shortages, evidence of reservoirs and aquifers drying up, and of course, plenty of people who simply don’t care.
But forget about us.
Most of us have never really been thirsty. We’ve never had to leave our houses and walk five miles to fetch water. We simply turn on the tap, and water comes out. Clean. Yet there are a billion people on the planet who don’t have clean water.
It’s hard to imagine what a billion people looks like really, but one in eight might be easier. One in eight people in our world don’t have access to the most basic of human needs. Something we can’t imagine going 12 hours without.
Here, we’d like to introduce you to a few of those billion people. They are very real, and they need our help. They didn’t choose to be born into a village where the only source of water is a polluted swamp. And we didn’t choose to be born in a country where even the homeless have access to clean water and a toilet.
We invite you to put yourself in their shoes. Follow them on their daily journey. Carry 80 pounds of water in yellow fuel cans. Dig with their children in sand for water. Line up at a well and wait eight hours for a turn.
Now, make a decision to help. We’re not offering grand solutions and billion dollar schemes, but instead, simple things that work. Things like freshwater wells, rainwater catchments and sand filters. For about $20 a person, we know how to help millions.
CHILDREN’S CUP
Our mission is to change the world for hurting and forgotten children by giving them hope in the love of Jesus Christ.
We do this by taking humanitarian and spiritual aid into the hard places where war, natural disasters and disease epidemics have devastated societies. These children in hard places know horrors most of our children have never even heard of. Food, shelter, medicine and education are not enough to heal their emotions. Most have been sexually abused, beaten and some have even been forced to murder and maim as child warriors. They need hope. Hope’s name is Jesus! Our work currently focuses heavily on Swaziland, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, and efforts are also underway in Vietnam and the Philippines.
It takes a comprehensive approach to caring for orphans and vulnerable children (OVC), and we do this by treating the whole child. Most of this is done for the children through our network of CarePoints. And a CarePoint is a what its name implies: a point of care. It can be set up with as little investment as a tent and some pots and bowls. When it is matured, in its most effective state, it is a central point for carrying out the many care-giving and developmental programs that Children’s Cup has proven that make a difference in a child’s life forever.
INTERNATIONAL JUSTICE MISSION (IJM)
International Justice Mission is a human rights agency that brings rescue to victims of slavery, sexual exploitation and other forms of violent oppression. IJM lawyers, investigators and aftercare professionals work with local officials to secure immediate victim rescue and aftercare, to prosecute perpetrators and to ensure that public justice systems – police, courts and laws – effectively protect the poor.
IJM’s justice professionals work in their communities in 13 countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America to secure tangible and sustainable protection of national laws through local court systems.
Through individual casework, IJM confronts aggressive human violence: violence that strips widows and orphans of their property and livelihoods, violence that steals dignity and health from children trafficked into forced prostitution, violence that denies freedom and security to families trapped in slavery.
Violence against the poor is not driven by the overwhelming power of the perpetrators – it is driven by the vulnerability of the victims. This violence can be stopped when the power of the law is brought to bear on behalf of those who need it, and when people of good will contribute their financial and professional resources to insisting it stop.
IJM’s casework model combats victimization and violence on the level of the individual, and supports functioning public justice systems where the poor urgently need an advocate.
In the tradition of heroic Christian leaders like abolitionist William Wilberforce and transformational leaders like Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King, Jr., IJM’s staff stand against violent oppression in response to the Bible’s call to justice (Isaiah 1:17): Seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow.
IJM seeks to restore to victims of oppression the things that God intends for them: their lives, their liberty, their dignity, the fruits of their labor. By defending and protecting individual human rights, IJM seeks to engender hope and transformation for those it serves and restore a witness of courage in places of oppressive violence. IJM helps victims of oppression regardless of their religion, ethnicity, or gender.
INVISIBLE CHILDREN
http://www.invisiblechildren.com/homepage
In the spring of 2003, three young filmmakers traveled to Africa in search of a story. What started out as a filmmaking adventure became much more when Jason, Laren, and Bobby stumbled upon Africa’s longest-running war–a conflict where children were both the weapons and the victims.
They produced the documentary Invisible Children: Rough Cut in 2005. At first they just showed it to their friends and family, but it wasn’t long before millions of people had seen the documentary and knew about the “invisible children.”
In 2006, Invisible Children, Inc., became an official 501(c)3 non-profit.
We are storytellers. We are visionaries, humanitarians, artists, and entrepreneurs. We are a generation eager for change and willing to pursue it.
With a U.S. headquarters in San Diego, CA, our programs rely on talented staff, hundreds of committed volunteers, and thousands of young activists who want to use their voices for peace.
We also have offices in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. These offices in Gulu and Dungu are primarily managed and operated by staff from LRA-affected communities.
Half our work happens on the ground in Central Africa, and the other half happens in the United States.
In Central Africa, all of our programming is a partnership between Invisible Children and LRA-affected communities. We focus on long-term goals that enable children to take responsibility for their futures and the futures of their countries. Our programs are carefully developed initiatives that address the need for quality education, mentorships, the redevelopment of schools, and financial stability.
Our work in the United States focuses on advocacy and inspiring America’s youth to “do more than just watch.” We believe that by uniting our voices we can use the systems, influence, and resources of the United States to expedite an end to the conflict.
LIVING WATER INTERNATIONAL: Providing A Cup Of Water in Jesus’ Name
Living Water International exists to demonstrate the love of God by helping communities acquire desperately needed clean water, and to experience “living water” - the Gospel of Jesus Christ – which alone satisfies the deepest thirst.
Nearly 21 years ago, we set out to help the church in North America be the hands and feet of Jesus by serving the poorest of the poor. More than a billion people in the world live on less than a dollar a day. 884 million people lack access to safe drinking water.
For all practical purposes, these statistics refer to the same people; around the world, communities are trapped in debilitating poverty because they constantly suffer from water-related diseases and parasites, and/or because they spend long stretches of their time carrying water over long distances.
In response to this need, we implement participatory, community-based water solutions in developing countries. Since we started, we’ve completed more than 10,000 water projects (and counting!) for communities in 26 countries.
It all began in 1990, when a group from Houston, Texas traveled to Kenya and saw the desperate need for clean drinking water. They returned to Houston and founded a 501(c)3 non-profit. The fledgling organization equipped and trained a team of Kenyan drillers, and LWI Kenya began operations the next year under the direction of a national board. That pattern continues today; we train, consult, and equip local people to implement solutions in their own countries. Remembering the life-changing nature of that first trip in 1990, we also lead hundreds of volunteers on mission trips each year, working with local communities, under the leadership of nationals, to implement water projects. It’s hard to know which lives are changed more—those “serving” or those “being served.” Our training programs in shallow well drilling, pump repair, and hygiene education have equipped thousands of volunteers and professionals in the basics of integrated water solutions since 1997.
NOTHING BUT NETS: Send a Net. Save a Life.
http://www.nothingbutnets.net/
Nothing But Nets is a global, grassroots campaign to raise awareness and funding to fight malaria, a leading cause of death among children in Africa. Nothing But Nets provides everyone – students to CEOs, bishops to basketball players – the opportunity to join the fight against malaria by giving $10 to send a net and save a life.
While the UN Foundation has been working with the UN to fight malaria for years, it was Rick Reilly’s column about malaria in Sports Illustrated challenging each of his readers to donate at least $10 to send anti-malaria bed nets, that led to the creation of the Nothing But Nets campaign in 2006.
In five years, the Nothing But Nets campaign has engaged hundreds of thousands of individuals to help achieve the UN goal of ending malaria deaths by 2015. We work with a diverse group of partners, including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the National Basketball Association’s NBA Cares, The People of The United Methodist Church, Vh1, Major League Soccer’s MLS W.O.R.K.S., Boy Scouts of America, the Women’s National Basketball Association, the Union for Reform Judaism, Usher’s New Look Foundation, Junior Chamber International, and Orkin, Inc., among others.
The success of Nothing But Nets is a testament to the power of passionate people coming together to make the world a better, healthier place. You can save a family. Your church, school, or sports team can save a village. Together, we can cover Africa with life-saving bed nets.
SPARROW RAINBOW VILLAGE
It is the mission of Sparrow Ministries to provide care and comfort to adults and children who have been infected or affected by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. We are both a Hospice for the terminally ill and a Children’s Home for those vulnerable children who have become homeless due to the death of one or both of their parents. Our ministry is one of health and hope.
Sparrow was founded by Rev. Corine McClintock in 1992. After a long and successful career as a nurse, Corine needed something else in her life. She asked God to show her a path. It was no coincidence that the reality of AIDS was becoming more and more evident just at the time that Corine was searching for her next challenge. She took in three men who were dying of AIDS. She provided them with care, comfort and support. Before too long, she realized what she must do and founded Sparrow Ministries. Since that time, Sparrow has grown to an organization that currently cares for over 225 children and 80 adults.
Hospice Care: AIDS continues to devastate South Africa. Patients arrive everyday at our door ravaged by the disease. Stigma and lack of accessibility to appropriate health care leave many people unable to care for themselves. They come to Sparrow because they know that they will be given the best care we can provide and we do so without judgement. Unfortunately, current medical treatment may not be able to save them but Sparrow gives them a safe and loving place to live out the rest of their lives. Fortunately, for more and more of them, we are able to nurse them back to reasonable health. We give them hope as well as Anti-Retrovirals and the combination of these two powerful remedies, has given many of our patients a new lease on life. They will always have the virus but now AIDS can become a manageable disease.
Chronic Care: Sparrow also provides chronic care for the destitute. Although our numbers of beds are limited, we continue to care for those patients who have no home to go or family to nurse them. All of our patients are special and deserving of proper nursing, healthy nutrition and a place to feel safe and loved.
Children’s Home: Our children have come to us from dust bins, trash heaps, the streets, hospitals and with their mothers who are too sick themselves to care for them. Some of these mothers were not so lucky and eventually passed away, leaving Sparrow to care and now raise these children.
Since our capacity is limited but our hearts are not, we provide a variety of different services to the vulnerable, destitute and terminally ill who reside in the communities in Gauteng as well as in Limpopo and Mogale City and Bloemfontein. We provide support and fill basic needs. As our organization has matured, we are asked frequently by donors to facilitate the distribution of these services. In this way, we are able to touch the lives of many who are desperately poor and sick.
We also provide training for home based cared givers who can return to their communities and assist with the sick.
There are many child-headed households in our area and we are involved in a project to support the grannies who are now caring for their grandchildren. This requires not only food and medical care but much needed emotional support as they try and cope with not only burying their children but having to raise their grandkids.
WATOTO: Rescue. Raise. Rebuild.
Watoto is a holistic care program that was initiated as a response to the overwhelming number of orphaned children and vulnerable women in Uganda. It is positioned to rescue the individual, raise each one as a leader in their chosen sphere of life so that they will in turn rebuild their nation.
The Watoto model involves physical care, medical intervention including HIV/AIDS treatment, education – formal and technical, trauma counseling, and spiritual discipleship.
We exist to raise the next generation of African leaders, by pursuing excellence in academic and practical skills, integrity in conduct and moral values, so that each one becomes a responsible Christian and a productive citizen.
We aim to care for 10,000 children in Uganda by 2023 and to replicate the model in other countries across the continent so as to fast-track the rescue of orphaned children and vulnerable women in Africa.
