Minutes From January Meeting
The meeting began at 10:00 A.M. and took place at the Church of the Epiphany. The Reverend Debbie Shew, Cannon for Community Ministries, Diocese of Atlanta, opened the meeting with prayer.
1. Parish Reports:
Terry Franzén, convener of the group, briefly described the origins of EAHC
and asked each parish representative to briefly introduce themselves, describe the
work which they are doing in Haiti, and tell us about any upcoming trip.
Parishes represented include Church of the Epiphany, Decatur; St. Francis, Macon; Holy Trinity, Decatur; Christ Church, Norcross; Advent, Madison; St. Paul’s, Atlanta; Christ Church, Kennesaw; and St. Luke’s, Atlanta. In addition, Rev. Debbie Shew represented the Diocese of Atlanta, Richard Hall represented the Diocese of Atlanta Global Mission Committee and attends All Saints (Atlanta), and Debbie Betsill represented Episcopal Relief and Development and attends St. Teresa’s, Acworth.
The following reports were presented:
Church of the Epiphany is partnered with the Bishop Tharpe Institute in Les
Cayes. They provide financial support, as well as technical expertise and building
relationships. They had planned a trip in December, which was cancelled at the last
minute due to the rioting in Haiti caused by the elections. They have another trip
planned for mid to late March.
St. Francis, which is assisted by Holy Family (Jasper) is partnered with St.
Marc’s in Trouin. St. Francis reported that their mission is education. They
provide funding for daily hot lunches at a cost of $1,700.00 per month to feed 400
children (22 ¢ per child/day) and they provide funding for 12 teachers at a cost of
$1,000.00 per person per year. They are very involved in fundraising both locally
and nationally and are seeking funds from various foundations with a goal to
rebuilding the school. They have recently identified a Virginia partner who will help
to rebuild the church. One of their successful ongoing fundraisers is a partnership
with a local Irish pub which donates 10% of the proceeds from two Wednesdays per
month to their Haiti work. The church has used this as fellowship time and meets at
the pub. They provided emergency relief following the quake. They have bought a
generator, and a truck for the school, which is driven by their priest. One of the
members of their group has established a Daughters of the King
chapter at St. Marc’s and at a few more locations. She is available to assist others
who wish to establish a chapter at their mission parish. They also started a goat
program.
Holy Trinity works through Food For The Poor to provide clean water and most
recently an installation of solar panels at a school. The Holy Trinity
parishioner who was present for the meeting, described the work of Medshare, which
is based in Decatur. Christ Church in Norcross also described further
work with Medshare, as well as through Christ Church’s becoming registered with the organization to obtain medical supplies for its medical mission trips. Tish said that Medshare is always seeking volunteers to assist
in sorting the medical supplies which it collects from local hospitals and that the work
is suitable for youth as well as adults. See also: Medshare
Christ Church (Norcross) also described their relationship with the Global Soap project, which is a non-profit based in Norcross. The founder of the project collects used soap from various hotels, sterilizes and re-melts the soap, and
produces new bars of soap. Christ Church has received donations for its mobile medical clinics to distribute to the patients. In addition to supporting education at its partner St. Joseph’s of Arimathea in Jasmin, Haiti and providing emergency aid after the quake, Christ Church has provided staffing and supplies for mobile medical
clinics for the last few years. The goal is to provide sustainable medical care through the use of Haitians, with supplements of mobile medical clinics twice a year. Christ Church has a trip planned March 11 through the 19th and a second trip planned September 24 through October 1st. Christ Church partners with St. Johns in Minnesota, which has partnered with the church down the hill from its mission and which is led by the same priest. Over three days, the mobile clinics serve over 600 people. The children seen at the clinic are given a hand-knitted doll or bear, which
are provided by several churches around the country. A congregation in Iowa provided cloth drawstring bags for giving the medicine to the patients. Both the dolls/bears and medicine bags were enthusiastically received. Christ Church has established a relationship with IMA World Health, an international nonprofit which provides medicine for medical mission teams. There is an application and approval process, following which the team can order medicine
which is delivered to the team in the states. The team is responsible for transporting the medicine to the location.
Church of the Advent has just recently established a relationship with three nonprofits on the
island of Ile-a-vache, an island located off the coast of Les Cayes. Church of the Advent
distributed a description of the organization, whose goal is to “walk alongside”
nonprofits who are already working on the island and to help establish an Ile-a-vache
development council. (Please contact Terry, Brian, or Debbie, for more information on Ile-a-Vache.) Church of the Advent will also contact Père Kesner Ajax, chair of the Diocese of Haiti Partnership Program, to begin discussions
and determine whether the Episcopal church is working on the island.
St. Paul’s and St. Bart’s jointly support the mission at Bois Blanc, and reported that their mission is education. Their school has 250 children. They provide daily feeding and salaries for nine teachers, as well as a custodian. They also provide uniforms and supplies for the school. In addition, they provide an
annual gift to the Micah Project in Mirabolais. The Reverend Joseph Constant is the chair of that project. This is a feeding program for street children and children displaced by the earthquake. They have a mission trip planned for April 9 through 14th. One of St. Paul’s members is an ophthalmologist, who has performed cataract surgery on these trips in the past and will do so again during this trip. There is a person from their parish who is in Haiti now, who will provide a report upon her return. Paulette reported that they do not engage in fundraising. Their Haiti mission is a line item in the church’s budget in the amount of $10,500.00. In addition, they have a designated fund to which individuals may donate. Jointly, they provide about $4,200.00 per quarter to support the school.
Christ Church Kennesaw’s representative described the work in which he personally is involved in Haiti. He is involved in housing reconstruction in Port-au-Prince with a business partner. He is an urban planner by trade and is working with the Haitian government. He also introduced his business partner, who spends about half of his time working in Haiti, and reported that the country is calm is at this time, that it appears that the run-off election will be resolved with Celestin withdrawing from the election, that the run-off is anticipated to be March 20th, and that he expects that the front-runner female candidate will be the winner. He did not anticipate there being problems with individuals traveling to Haiti in the near future. They also reported on a water program one of their partners has developed using 5-gallon buckets.
St. Luke’s representative stated she was present to learn and did not have a report.
2. Establishment of EAHC Facebook® Page
There was discussion about the need for better communication among our
group. Rev. Debbie Shew has established a blog which is linked on the Diocese
Global Mission page. Brian Gross, a member of Epiphany, agreed to work with
Debbie and Terry to set up and administer a Facebook® page for the group.
3. What are we called to do?
Debbie Shew reported on the Diocese of Haiti’s request to the National Church
to assist in rebuilding the Cathedral Center in Port-au-Prince. The National Church
has recently announced a fundraising effort focusing on a “buy a brick” program.
The Diocese of Atlanta is formulating its appeal to the churches in our diocese and
there will be more information about this project in the near future. The Diocese
Global Mission Committee had discussed a clean water project in the Diocese of
Haiti. This project may be delayed in light of the Diocese of Haiti’s request to assist
in rebuilding the Cathedral complex. There will be more information about this at a
later time, after the Diocese of Atlanta has formulated its plan.
4. Other matters.
There was discussion about the need to establish principles within our group for
working with our Haitian partners. The group discussed that these principles should
include working through the Haiti Partnership Program, a requirement of
accountability from our Haitian partners, and a requirement that our Haitian partners
refrain from the use of restavek children in their homes. These principles will be
discussed in further detail at our next meeting.
David from Advent briefly described the Corbett list, which is a bulletin board for Haiti discussions. There was a suggestion that rather than spending time in our meeting discussing the work in individual parishes, that we post individual parish’s stories on the Diocese website
and on our Facebook® page. To that end, someone from each parish please provide a
narrative report to Terry Franzén and she will
forward these to the appropriate individuals. Please see the recommended outline. Our future meetings will attempt to focus on specific action items or areas of interest, with a call for agenda items prior to the meeting. As in the past, the Agenda will be
distributed to the group prior to the meeting.
Marcia from St. Francis reminded everyone that it is very expensive to
ship items to Haiti and that once the items arrive, the duty, whether formal or
informal, which must be paid in order to obtain the goods, is also very expensive.
Accordingly, it is preferable to take items with you when you travel to Haiti, rather
than attempting to ship items. She also reported that her group has been
successful in obtaining a corporate match for donations to its Haiti program, despite
the fact that the program is faith-based.
5. Future Meetings.
Terry reminded everyone of the National Episcopal Church Mission
Conference, which is jointly sponsored by ERD, GEMN, and ETGM, to be held
October 13-15, 2011 in Estes Park, Colorado. St. Paul’s will host the next EAHC
meeting, which will most likely take place after Easter. If you would like to host the
summer meeting, which is tentatively scheduled for July 23rd, please notify Terry. As
soon as the next meeting date is confirmed, that date will be sent out to the group.
The fall meeting will take place as part of the Diocese of Atlanta’s Global Mission
Conference, which will take place in early October at a place to be determined. The
information about the Conference will be distributed to the group as soon as it is
confirmed.
The meeting closed at noon with the Lord’s Prayer.
Respectfully submitted,
Terry Franzén
Christ Church Norcross
Presiding Bishop visits Haiti
Presiding bishop pays pastoral visit to Haitian bishop
‘You have already had your Good Friday,’ Jefferts Schori tells Duracin
By Mary Frances Schjonberg, February 08, 2010
[Episcopal News Service] Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori paid a poignant visit to Port-au-Prince Feb. 8 to survey with Episcopal Diocese of Haiti Bishop Jean Zaché Duracin the devastation wrought by the Jan. 12 magnitude 7.0 earthquake.
After climbing over the ruins of the diocese’s Cathédrale Sainte Trinité (Holy Trinity Cathedral), the presiding bishop turned to Duracin and said “You should skip Lent this year; you have already had your Good Friday.”
Saturday’s Meeting Needs You — so y’all come!
The Holy Spirit knew what She was up to: well before the earthquake, a group of folks had decided to host a gathering of those people/parishes already involved in Hait along with those who were curious, wanted to learn more, were discerning whether they or their parish had a call to such ministry. The date they chose was Saturday, January 30, 2010. Little did they know how urgent and valuable this chance to meet together was going to become, very shortly, in ways that none of us could have imagined.
So now we need YOU — to spread the word, to come yourself, to invite others who might be interested, to bring updates and resources you already have so we can share them. You get the idea.
WHEN: Saturday, January 30th, 2010. 10:00 am to 12 noon
WHERE: Holy Trinity Parish, Decatur
515 E. Ponce de Leon Ave
Decatur, GA 30030
404-377-2622
If you can come, we’d love to know. We’ll have a chair ready for you. (But this is merely helpful, NOT required. Come at the last minute and bring your buddies!) You can post a comment here or email Debbie Shew at dshew@episcopalatlanta.org.
SEE YOU THERE!
Our hearts are in Haiti
It has been horrendous for all of us to be watching the images and information flowing out of Haiti this last week or so. Here in the Diocese of Atlanta, many of us have beloved companions about whom we are anxious to get news and even more, about how we can help in the most effective ways. I’ve created this blog as a sort of “gathering space” and “resource center” for those of us wanting to receive (and to share) the most accurate and up-to-date- information we can find. I hope you will check back often and that you’ll share your own information and resources.
I’d like to begin by sharing a prayer written by our dear brother in Christ, Bishop Jeffery Rowthorn. He offered it on the Thursday morning after the quake hit, at the start of the Episcopalians for Global Reconciliation (EGR) board conference call, in honor of Lisa Mbele-Mbong, whose mother Helena, some of you will remember as my roommate at Everyone, Everywhere ’08 and/or as a deputy to General Convention. EGR has now shared it more widely as a gift and resource for the church (see note at end re: source location). Jeffery says it well for all of us, I think:
Praying for Haiti in the Aftermath of the Earthquake
In grateful memory of Lisa Mbele-Mbong, Port-au-Prince, January 12, 2010Reading Mark 4: 35-41
On that day, when evening had come, Jesus said to them: “Let us go across to the other side.”…. They took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. Jesus said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”
Litany
(after each section of the litany the leader says the response in Creole or English and then the people repeat it)For the faith of the people of Haiti, singing their hymns even as their hearts are breaking:
Beni swa l’Eternel / Blessed be the Eternal One (repeated by all present)For their selfless efforts to rescue loved ones and neighbors from the rubble:
ResponseFor the assurance that the many who have died are not lost for ever but rest in the Lord:
ResponseFor the God-given capacity to share the sufferings of others and to respond to their needs:
ResponseFor the nations of the world putting aside their differences to unite in offering assistance:
ResponseFor doctors and nurses, soldiers and relief workers, bringing help and hope to the needy:
ResponseFor Episcopal and other relief agencies, gathering contributions and putting them to work:
ResponseFor the healing and hope offered to all by Jesus Christ the Light of the World:
ResponseFor “the love of God from which neither life, nor death, nor things present, nor things to come, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us”:
ResponseFree Prayer (either spoken or silent)
Concluding Prayer
Jesus, Savior in times of storm,
when the waters of the deep are broken up
and all the landmarks crumble before our eyes,
come to our aid and hold us up.
Support the people of Haiti at this time
lest they sink in hopelessness and despair.
Empower those who are responding to their need;
uphold the bereaved in their grief;
and let your light shine in the present darkness
to lead us all to the city securely built on your love;
In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
“Our Father…”
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all. Amen.
Bishop Jeffrey Rowthorn, Episcopalians for Global Reconciliation
January 15, 2010(also available for download at http://www.e4gr.org/haiti.html)
