2019 Thank you
2019 – Haiti is still hard. The contrast to life in the US is still dramatic. The city is dirty, the homes inadequate, clean water, and food are hard to achieve for all but the most wealthy families. This year saw absurdly high gas prices of $20 a gallon, the closing schools, riots in the streets, and mass malnutrition.
Michael and I feel the pain and poverty on our hearts. We go there to offer ourselves, our skills, our time, our money, in service to fellow humans who seem to have it so much harder and rougher than we do. In and amongst the suffering, we forge on, doing our little bit to continue to offer a whisper of hope.
Even though no US missionaries traveled to Haiti on our behalf of in January, the Foundation Patrick Charles team in Haiti ran a very successful project, building a huge church in the community.
We had hoped to adopt Gloria and Gomex Charles after the death of our dear friend. We were unable to do so. They continue to live with their aunt and grandmother. We provide food and financial support for them.
Anna Goldston, a dentist, and Michael Goldston, a UMC pastor, joined us in July for a wonderfully uplifting mission trip. This included running a Dental clinic for the second time in which we worked alongside a local dentist. We pulled lots of teeth and cleaned many more. We even performed a root canal and constructed a new front tooth for a teenage boy.
Pastor Goldston ran a class of local pastors discussing the purpose of the church in the community. We distributed Creole bibles.
We helped our local team build more stairs up the mountain, this time with a landing for safety. (OSHA still wouldn’t approve, but it is safer than that last set of stairs we built!)
We provided scholarships for many students to attend school. Unfortunately, the schools closed due to the rioting this fall. We were happy to hear they finally reopened in early December.
And while our budget is small, we were able to amp up the feeding program in October, November and December to help the growing problem of starvation and malnutrition in Haiti after this desperate year of rioting and political turmoil. We gave away 119,000 meals in 2019!