PRAYER: Haiti residents of St. Louis Gonzaga IDP Camp pray in front of tents during a three-day mourning period for the country.
(Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)
Faith-based groups pitch in for Haiti
By Cathy Lynn Grossman, USA TODAY More than $300 million dollars and thousands of volunteers — all powered by religious faith — have poured in to earthquake-shattered Haiti to help rebuild the country and restore its spirit.
Church by church, parish by parish, hundreds of thousands of Americans have donated funds or traded vacations for mission trips. Although international governmental aid is the mainstay of Haiti relief, faith-based groups offer significant muscle in funds and volunteers.
Among the leaders, Catholic Relief Services has raised $192 million, including $80 million raised in a special U.S. parish collection. About 80% of Haitians say they are Catholic.
The agency doubled its Haiti-based staff from 300 workers before the quake to 600 now. It expanded its focus from agriculture and HIV/AIDS work to emergency food and shelters, reconstruction employment for 10,000 Haitians and, now, to fighting the cholera epidemic on the northern side of the island, spokesman Tom Price says. And $33 million will be set aside to rebuild Catholic churches, schools and seminaries. Also, nearly 500 U.S. parishes and Catholic institutions have partnerships in Haiti, regularly sending aid and volunteers.
Samaritan's Purse, an evangelical Christian global relief agency, "raised more for Haiti this year than for any project we've ever undertaken, $51 million — most with $40 individual donations," agency founder Rev. Franklin Graham says.
About $30 million of that has been spent, focused in the quake epicenter. Initially, Samaritan's Purse volunteers concentrated in the devastated capital, Port-au-Prince. Fourteen shiploads of cargo and machinery arrived to provide tons of food. Volunteers also helped build shelters and housing for more than 50,000 Haitians. In October, they switched their focus full time on fighting the cholera outbreak.
"We fly in incredible volunteer doctors and nurses who work in the most filthy, horrific conditions in 24-hour shifts at our two clinics. Cholera can kill a weakened person in four hours, and we have no idea how many have died already," Graham says.
Recently, he led Sarah Palin and a Fox News team on a tour of their efforts, hoping the news coverage would prompt the release of medical supplies that have been stalled in Haiti customs wrangling.
Graham returned to Haiti on Sunday, at the request of 500 Haitian churches, to lead an evangelism festival. Graham says, "We felt it was time to focus on what God has done, on the lives that have been saved, and to give God the glory for all he's done for good."
The United Methodist Church raised more than $43 million for Haiti after the quake. Its Committee on Relief has sent more than 80 volunteer mission teams last year and expects to double that number in 2011 to work in clearing rubble, distributing food and rebuilding infrastructure.
Meanwhile, Methodist churches across the USA have contributed with fundraisers and projects such as assembling health kits or building mobile medical clinics. The church is drafting a five-year relief and recovery plan.
The North American Mission Board (NAMB), the Southern Baptist Convention's agency for relief efforts at home and abroad, has helped steer more than $10 million to Haiti. More than 2000 Baptist volunteers from 39 states and Canada worked in Haiti relief this year and joined with the two major Haitian Baptist organizations to deliver tons of food, build hundreds of temporary shelters, launch repair of 186 damaged churches and build 72 churches. Baptist churches in the USA have sent 150,000 Buckets of Hope, each holding a week's worth of food staples for a family.
Still ahead: a pledge to build 6,200 cement block homes by the end of 2013 by teaching construction skills to Haitians. So far, 250 pilot homes have been built in a program parallel to the NAMB's Operation Noah, a mainstay in New Orleans reconstruction after Hurricane Katrina.
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My key question now is: Where is the Watchtower? Why its not mentioned? Is it all about selfishness? Could be that the WTS is too poor to afford emmergency assistance? What do you think?
Scott77
