FROM THE FIELD
In Today's Hotline: Read how UMCOR is responding to needs around the world:
MOZAMBIQUE: Health Education and Training SAGER BROWN: Helping Communities in Home Repair BURUNDI: Alleviating Hunger SOUTH AFRICA: Providing RefugeMOZAMBIQUE: HEALTH EDUCATION AND TRAINING
UMCOR Health is providing general health and HIV/AIDS education and training through the Center of Hope Community Health and HIV/AIDS project, a program of the Chicuque Rural United Methodist Hospital. The program will benefit more than 100,000 people in the Maxixe District in Mozambique.
UMCOR will train 10 community health promoters to assist 21 satellite community health workers to identify and mobilize people with AIDS for anti-retroviral treatment or tuberculosis treatment services. UMCOR will support a community-wide HIV/AIDS awareness campaign, promote safe motherhood education and provide pre and post marital counseling.
Center of Hope was established in 2008 through the United Methodist Global AIDS Fund to support the health needs of the most vulnerable. Please give generously to the UM Global AIDS Fund, UMCOR Advance # 982345.
SAGER BROWN: HELPING COMMUNITIES WITH HOME REPAIR
Volunteers working at UMCOR's Sager Brown campus in Baldwin, La., do more than prepare emergency relief kits, they help their community with home repairs.
Sager Brown volunteers helped Bobbie, a Louisiana resident who after colon cancer surgery had to use a walker. Bobbie's doorway was too narrow to accommodate her walker, so the volunteers brought tools and materials and widened her doorway. The volunteers also replaced her front door.
Barbara Snell, who directs of outreach ministries at UMCOR Sager Brown says there are approximately 80 applications from people in the community who are requesting home repairs—demonstrating a strong need in the Sager Brown community in addition to kit ministry that reaches around the world.
Support UMCOR Sager Brown Depot by giving to Material Resources, UMCOR Advance #901440.
In East Africa, a three-year drought has affected the once fertile land of Burundi which produced high amounts of beans and sorghum for the entire country. Food shortages have resulted across the Kirundo and Muyinga provinces forcing residents in Kirundo to live on leaves and roots to survive.
UMCOR is responding with an emergency grant to the East Africa Annual Conference. They will distribute food and supplies to support the needs of 6,000 Burundi people. Rice, maize flour, beans, cooking oil, salt and more will be distributed to those who are most vulnerable.
Burundi is one of the ten poorest countries in the world. Support UMCOR in providing emergency food to famine-stricken homes in Burundi by giving to International Disaster Relief, UMCOR Advance #982450.
SOUTH AFRICA: PROVIDING REFUGE
Hundreds of children displaced by social and political violence in Zimbabwe are finding refuge at the UMCOR-supported Central Methodist Mission in Johannesburg, South Africa.
With assistance from UMCOR, Central Methodist Mission provides daily meals and education to about 420 refugee children living at the Mission and attending the Albert Street School. UMCOR supports teacher salaries and helps maintain utility costs incurred by the Mission and the school.
About 2,000 refugees reside at Central Methodist Mission and several unaccompanied minor children, as young as seven years old arrive daily looking for food, a safe place to sleep, clothing and counseling. You can help Central Methodist Mission continue to be a place of refuge for hundreds of Zimbabweans seeking safety there. Give to South Africa Relief and Development, UMCOR Advance #3020999.
RESOURCES: STARTING A HEALTH MINISTRY?
If your congregation would like to start a health ministry, a practical tool is now available through UMCOR Health.
UMCOR's "Introduction to Health Ministry for United Methodist Congregations" is a booklet that provides practical tools to develop an effective health ministry within your local congregation. The booklet shares basic health ministry models and ideas for resource development.
Download your free copy today. For additional information on congregational health ministries, please click here.
UMCOR provides emergency relief in many areas of the world. To find out more about UMCOR's ministries, please visit umcor.org. You can donate to any project by placing a contribution in the offering plate at a local United Methodist church; by sending a check to UMCOR, PO Box 9068, New York, NY 10087-9068; or by calling 1-800-554-8583, where credit card donations are accepted. You can also give online at givetomission.org. UMCOR is exempt from tax under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code of the United States and qualifies for the maximum charitable contribution deduction by donors.
United Methodist Committee on Relief
General Board of Global Ministries, The United Methodist Church
Room 330, 475 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10115
Voice Phone: 1-212-870-3816; FAX: 1-212-870-3624
Email: umcor@gbgm-umc.org
Web: http://www.umcor.org
UMCOR. Be There. Be Hope.
UMCOR's mission is to alleviate human suffering-whether caused by war, conflict, or natural disaster-with open minds and hearts to all people.
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]
