Dear People of Christ Church,
Looking out at the snow, I'm getting ready for the presentation I'll share after church this Sunday about my sabbatical trip to Africa. Three months ago at this time, I was sitting in a cinderblock church in Kizara, Tanzania. I was one of about 20 at the altar-twelve other priests and two bishops, plus six altar servers-and the only woman. But what a glorious day. It took us six hours to drive up the Usambara mountains to the tiny village of Kizara, where the Massachusetts-based Friends of Tanzania had helped to fund the construction of a health center. I was there with Bishop Shaw and a constellation of other clergy and lay people from home to bless it and celebrate the new care that would be available to people in that very remote part of the world.
Our group left on December 2, all of our bags loaded down with candy, bubbles, and school supplies (many donated by YOU!) to share with the children we would meet. I felt some uneasiness in appearing suddenly as strangers with candy-on the face of it, pretty useless-but after spending some time with people I felt less angst and more... fun. After all, Jesus didn't turn water into a nutritious wheat grass soy shake-he turned it into wine. Doing the hokey pokey with our lollipops in a churchyard in Kasese, Uganda while children's parents went for HIV testing and younger siblings were vaccinated was definitely a Cana moment. Love is an international language-apparently also refined sugar.
Our trip was divided into two parts-one week in Tanzania hosted by the Anglican Diocese of Tanga and five days (not counting travel time) in Kasese, Uganda, hosted by the Bishop Masereka Christian Foundation. We landed at the airport in Mt Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, and drove to Korogwe, the home of the Diocesan offices, where our task was to visit parishes and build relationships between Tanzania and Massachusetts. The Anglican Church in Tanzania has good British Oxford Movement roots and is correspondingly high church, so Bishop Shaw and Bishop Maimbo blessed the health center that day in fine form with cope and miter on a rainy, 80 degree day. We blessed a lot of things on the trip-swing sets, a kindergarten classroom, sewing machines, hospital rooms-there was such an embodied sense of God's generosity and celebration.
Our time in Tanzania was all church. The next week, our Uganda visit was all mission. Bishop Masereka has visited our diocese several times (and has preached here and at St Peter's), so I thought I had some sense of what they do-I was wrong. It's nearly impossible to convey just with words the astonishing difference the Foundation makes in the lives of the people of Kasese.
The Foundation's work is divided between health care and education. Our diocesan collaborative campaign (to which Christ Church has so far given about $35,000 through our Together Now pledges-yay!) has supported the construction of a new and Jubilee Funds have supported the education program as well. Their health work is currently done out of their health center and mobile clinic (which reaches those who can't or won't come to their offices). With a 15% rate of HIV infection among adults in Kasese, the district is home to 15,000 to 20,000 orphans. Funding school is hard enough (the fees for primary school are about $400 a year, depending on whether in includes room and board), but for kids without a stable home situation, it's next to impossible. In the education program, sponsored students are given 360 degrees of support-from tuition and fees to books to girls' menstrual products-there is no barrier left standing between these dedicated students and their education. Students come from families where one or both parents have died from HIV, or are themselves positive or otherwise vulnerable. BMCF supports 611 children, more than 50% of whom don't live with a parent. Ann Nyangoma and her staff spare nothing in their efforts to keep kids in school, but financial barriers are another question-there are always more kids who need help.
What was most amazing-and there were a lot of amazing things on that trip-was how much confidence I came out of it in the work that's being done. I really believe that the Diocese of Tanga is going to follow through on their "Vision 2025" plan to expand accountability in their organizations and clergy support through their parishes. I really believe that fewer kids will drop out of school, that fewer mothers will pass HIV on to their babies. We saw a lot of struggle, but also a lot of hope.
This Sunday after our 10 am service, I'll share more about our trip. For our international Easter collection this year, the Vestry has decided to send our support to the Masereka Foundation's Children's Program, so I hope you'll choose to give generously. Last year's "Creole Pig" collection for Haiti gathered about $800-about enough for two kids to attend school for a year. Do you think we could go for $1200 and get three kids enrolled?
Hear more on Sunday.
blessings,
Sara+
p.s. I blogged all the steamy (literally steamy-hot and rainy season steamy) details at my blog --click on "Tanzania and Uganda." You can also read more about the ministries in Tanzania at Friends of Tanzania/Tanga
See also:
The Bishop Masereka Christian Foundation
The Anglican Diocese of Tanga
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