Child of Everyone

The Dinka people of Eastern Africa have the wise saying, "A child is a child of everyone." We Disciples, then, care for many thousands of "our" children through the ministries funded by our gifts to Week of Compassion.

Some of our children learn to read because Week of Compassion brings education into their villages. In Haiti, children receive education (food for the mind) and hot meals (food for the body), a combination that strengthens them intellectually and physically.

When our children live in situations of war, their emotional health needs attention. In Iraq, a traveling theater group draws out laughter from children who have been traumatized by war, who are autistic, deaf and mute, those who live in orphanages, refugee camps, poor neighborhoods, or those in hospitals.

Some of our babies survive birth and their first weeks of life because Week of Compassion provides medical care for mothers and infants in their area. In Venezuela, entire families are welcomed at Casa Bette (Betty's House) when a baby is due, providing safety and health care in a country where medical care is often unavailable and far away.

In Zimbabwe, children who have been orphaned or abandoned because of the AIDS/HIV epidemic
that is devastating that country have shelter, food, clothing - all the basic necessities of life, including a warm, caring home environment at Khayelihle Children's Village. because of Week of Compassion's support.

Many of our children avoid starvation because Week of Compassion arranges for food distribution in their towns. A 2004 shipment to the Democratic Republic of North Korea was destined for baby homes, children's centers and maternity hospitals with enough refined wheat flour to bake some 132,000 loaves of bread.

Some of our children have safe homes because Week of Compassion enabled them to resettle away from the terrors of war. Semsudin Tahirovic left Bosnia and resettled in Connecticut, saying, "We feel like birds freed from a cage."

We celebrate these affirmations of life among children whom we do not know, but who are "ours" nonetheless. Jesus said, "Truly, I tell you, just as you did it to the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me." (Mt 25:40)

We Arrive Early and Stay Long

"The worst humanitarian crisis in the world today" is the description the United Nations used in 2004 for the crisis in the Darfur region of the Sudan, in eastern Africa.

It is no wonder, when, at the time, more than a million people were displaced from their homes in Darfur, and more than 100,000 others had fled to neighboring Chad. Civilians were subjected to mass rapes and executions. Homes were looted and destroyed, crops ruined and livestock killed. Even those who made their way to camps for displaced persons were attacked when they took care of necessities like gathering firewood.

Horrifying photos of mass graves, of entire villages burned down, of children carrying babies toward a camp, of bodies left unburied as warnings to survivors, and of other atrocities, began to show up on the Internet sites of international agencies.

By the time most Americans saw even the earliest news reports of this crisis, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and our partners were already in action to relieve the suffering in Darfur. Week of Compassion made several grants for Darfur to our ecumenical partner Church World Service (CWS). CWS has been working in partnership with Action by Churches Together, the Sudan Council of Churches, Norwegian Church Aid and the Catholic organization Caritas Internationalis to bring relief to some 500,000 refugees in Darfur, including 50,000 children under five years of age.

Gifts to Week of Compassion make it possible to offer such early assistance when a crisis begins. Just as important, our gifts make it possible for help to continue long after the news spotlight has faded, leaving behind hundreds of thousands of shattered lives in need of rebuilding. People who used to call Darfur "home" will need us to remember them in the years ahead. Through our gifts to Week of Compassion, we can show them we care. In such a time of need, we come early and stay long.