Building New Futures for Congo - January 2011

The support and partnership you and other caring concerned people provide through HEAL Africa are transforming lives in Congo. It has been a difficult year, but we are seeing signs of hope emerge as the successor to despair.

HEAL Africa's staff is working daily across conflict zones in one of the most dangerous places in the world to bring healing, hope and safety to a new generation in Congo. They could not do this important work without the support of people like you. Your donations bring essential material support. They pay for the programs and resources that help heal bodies and communities in eastern Congo.

A donation can change a person's life.

$100 can provide a Fresh Start Kit for a woman to begin a new life, with training and the equipment for a new business that will bring her income, independence, and a new sense of self-determination. Meet Anna. She will leave with a sewing machine, scissors, cloth, thread, and the training she needs to start her own business. She will also be linked to the network of counselors and Women Stand Up Together houses in her home area. She is no longer alone.

$100 funds a HEAL Africa Women Stand Up Together safe house for a week. For one week, women can find a place of refuge from violence, a place of healing, sisterhood, counseling, referral to medical care, education, literacy, vocational training, and opportunity. A network of 30 houses is creating a safety net for women in communities across eastern Congo.

$50 can partly fund the start of a Safe Motherhood Solidarity Group, where 10 women will work together to manage a micro-insurance fund to guarantee that each of them will receive proper medical care through their pregnancies and childbirth. HEAL Africa's Safe Motherhood program is achieving measurable results -- more women deliver in safer circumstances, both mothers and babies are healthy.

$25 helps a woman like Nyota, whose name means Star, learn a vocation other than heavy agricultural work in the fields out of town. While she awaits fistula repair surgery at the hospital, she's learning valuable skills about baking and how to run a small business. When her body is healed, she'll leave the hospital with new skills and a way to support herself as she restarts her life. She'll be connected with other women who understand her story, and are learning, growing and healing as well.

This year as you consider your holiday and end-of-year giving, please remember Anna, Nyota, the Wamama Simameni houses and the many others whose lives could be transformed with your help. Your support is also a constant reminder to HEAL Africa's staff that the world has not left them alone in their mission to help individuals and communities create a better future in central Africa.

Peace to you as you read this, grace and blessings to you and your loved ones for the coming New Year,


Judy Anderson
Executive Director