The staff of Brethren Disaster Ministries have directed recent grants from the Church of the Brethren’s Emergency Disaster Fund (EDF) to support aid being provided to families in need by the Rwanda Church of the Brethren; and to support volunteer training by Child Life Disaster Relief.
Financial support for these grants is received at https://churchofthebrethren.givingfuel.com/bdm.
Please pray… For the Rwandan Brethren aiding children and families in need, and for those receiving training through Child Life Disaster Relief.
Child Life Disaster Relief
A grant of $8,750 supports Child Life Disaster Relief, a small nonprofit organization that partners with Children’s Disaster Services (CDS) of the Church of the Brethren. The grant will help this partner organization increase capacity to equip and train volunteers. CDS has partnered with Child Life Disaster Relief since 2016 to recruit, train, and deploy volunteers that are trained Child Life Specialist professionals, with education and experience to support children through trauma. Many of these volunteers also are trained as CDS volunteers and deploy with CDS.
Rwanda
A grant of $5,300 enables the Rwanda Church of the Brethren to feed and provide soap for 112 vulnerable children and their families.
These children and their families have been negatively affected by a combination of situations affecting the Gisenyi area, including the marginalization of the Batwa community, decreased agricultural production due to heavy rains and erosion, reduced work for day laborers, armed conflict in neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), increased rates of inflation, and increasing cost and availability of commodities, especially food. Many of these families cross the border into the DRC to work as day laborers. Many Rwandan families have fostered or adopted children due to government policies of limiting orphanages, adding to the strain.
Members of the church initially provided meals for some hungry children on their own. A $5,000 EDF grant in 2022 funded a program that fed an average of 110 children for more than 26 weeks. The church has requested support to continue the program for another 26 weeks. The EDF received a $5,000 designated donation for feeding children in Rwanda, after the donor learned of the effectiveness of this program.
‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑‑
Find more Church of the Brethren news:
- Annual Conference 2024 invites Church of the Brethren to gather in Grand Rapids
- Annual Conference officers return query regarding congregational latitude on matters of human sexuality
- Silent Auction to benefit translation expenses and the general Annual Conference budget
- Mission and Ministry Board completes Kingian Nonviolence training, works at envisioning
- Leadership Team issues clarification on On Earth Peace membership with Supportive Communities Network