Kamuli Village Well is in

Today I am in Sioux Falls, South Dakota (enroute to Rosebud Reservation), to give a report to Wesley United Methodist Church about the deep water well they sponsored in the Kamphenda area of Northern Malawi. This year's confirmants--youth joining the church--took on a village well project they called "Well Well Well" and raised $5,000 in six months to sponsor a WorldHope Corps well.   We were able to match that amount from the Well Fund to pay for a new well in Kamuli village in July...and I am delighted to share photos and a report of how over 1000 villagers now have clean, potable water that will save lives.

"I was thirsty and you gave me a drink..." Jesus said in Matthew 25.   The "Well Well Well"  youth presented me with one of their fund-raising T-shirts with this scripture on the back.  I responded by saying:

"Jesus also said, 'whosoever offers a cup of cold water in my name shall not lose their reward.' Sometimes we are called to do more than offer a cup of water; sometimes we are able to provide a deep water well so that over 1000 people can draw buckets of water every day. What you have done in providing a new well at Kamuli will literally save the lives of many people, especially children under the age of 5, who otherwise would get sick or die from waterborne diseases.

"Women (more than men) typically walk 3-5 miles each day to fetch a pale of water from the nearest water source. Often these water sources--stream, mud hole, shallow welll or a rain puddle during the rainy season--are contaminated and unsuitable for drinking.

Kamphenda--a rural area about 4 hours from Mzuzu--is a remote area targeted by the Church and Society unit of the Synod of Livingstonia in Malawi for community development. WorldHope Corps is pleased to partner with them to provide as many as 20 deep water wells in villiages where their volunteers are working, teaching, organizing and promoting human rights.

The new well in Kamuli is number 12 in our ongoing commitment since 2007 to sponsor village wells.

Rebecca's Well in Njuyu village, and Helen Ford's well in Wilrilo village--both hear primarily schools--where the other two wells we sponsored and installed during our mission trip in July.

more photos to come.

Here are a few photos of the new village well, installed on July 15, 2010, through project manager Jim McGill and Andrew Solidad:

Mother Shalom

South Central, Los Angeles, was the neighborhood in the city where Communities of Shalom began in 1992. I met Marx Gutierrez from El Salvador who was there attending High School at the time. He remembers what happened at the corner of Florence and Normandy Streets in South Central, LA, when Reginald Denny was pulled out of his truck and beaten while the crowd looked on and the police did nothing; and how the Rodney King beating resulted in a not-guilty verdict for the police and resulted in a major, 3-day uprising in the neighborhood, until the National Guard came in and finally imposed law and order. He can still remember the fires, the bright orange night sky, the mass looting, 45 unsolved killings, the social chaos...And how the United Methodist Churches responded by creating a zone of shalom in 7 neighborhoods of Los Angeles. Today, Marx is a community organizer, and married to Jennifer Gutierrez, Conference Shalom Coordinator in the Calif-Pacific Annual Conference, and Rev. Vilma

First Generation Lambs Club Reunion

Fifteen of us gathered Saturday night at the Lambs Club for a 35 th year reunion of those who helped start the Lamb’s Church in Times Square in the mid to late 1970’s, including: Rev. Paul S. Moore , Founder of the Lamb’s Church of the Nazarene, and his wife, Tamara Dr. Michael J. Christensen , charter member and former associate pastor, and his wife Dr. Rebecca Laird Fr. William (BJ) Webe r, former Associate Pastor and Director of the Lamb’s Residency, and his wife Sheila who lived at the Lamb’s Jim and Dustee Hullinger, who were on staff together and made the Lamb’s their home for over 25 years Effie Canepa , who was the church pianist under 3 pastors, and her husband Peter Shirley Close, who attended the Lamb’s in the late 1970’s while studying, performing and teaching music and voice Carl "Chappy" Valente , former associate pastor Rev. Bob DiQuatto , lead singer of the Church’s “Manhattan Project” and staff member of the Lamb’s, and his son Jason Rev. Gabriel

Liberation Spirituality: Henri Nouwen and Gustavo Gutierrez in Dialogue

Liberation Spirituality: Henri Nouwen and Gustavo Gutierrez in Dialogue Lecture Notes: Presented by Michael J. Christensen, Ph.D., Associate Professor in the Practice of Spirituality and Ministry, Drew University; and International Director, Communities of Shalom, The United Methodist Church Introduction “There is a little man in Peru, a man without any power, who lives in a barrio with poor people and who wrote a book. In this book he simply reclaimed the basic Christian truth that God became human to bring good news to the poor, new light to the blind, and liberty to the captives. Then years later this book and movement it started is considered a danger by [the USA, or Rome], the greatest power on earth. When I look at this little man, Gustavo, and think about [the President of the US, or the Pope], I see David standing before Goliath, again with no more weapon than a little stone, a stone called A Theology of Liberation (Henri Nouwen

WorldHope Corps

Search This Blog