"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. " - Jesus
"Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. " - Jesus
See Maputo, Mozambique: Get Acquainted in Less than a Minute.
(Directed by Mickey Fonseca, Shot/edited by Pipas Forjaz. Music by Moreira Chonguiça)
Love Maputo Project
JESUSpolitik
is working with local nationals in Mozambique to provide direct aide to Maputo's poor,
oppressed, hungry, homeless, sick, abandoned and otherwise
forgotten people through the "Love Maputo" project.
In African hospitals, food is not provided. It can be difficult to make food arrangements if you are already poor to begin with or if you are alone. The workers of the "Love Maputo" project visit the sick in the hospitals and bring them food. They pray with them. They give them hope, encouragement and inspiration.
The streets are lined with children in Maputo. There are so many that are homeless. This leaves children vulnerable to sexual molestation, prostitution, bonded labor, drug trafficking, starvation, AIDS and more horrors than you can imagine. Life is hard on the streets.
The
workers of the "Love Maputo" project have been sent by God to protect these children.
The "Love Maputo" project provides
food, clothing, water, blankets and a safe place to sleep.
One of the workers with "Love Maputo," Raquel runs a small training center that teaches girls that
were victims of prostitution to learn new
vocational skills, like sewing clothing. embroidery and making
toys The toys they make are often
given to other street kids as a way that the girls can have their
own ministry, too. During this time with the "Love Maputo"
project, they are
introduced to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Souls are getting saved.
They don't have to sell their bodies anymore.
We need your help to make this mission permanent. We're working with Ten Thousand Homes to build a permanent safe house that is locally staffed and locally sustainable where street kids can stay, gain vocational skills and start a new life in Jesus.
Two local workers, Mugara and Raquel now spearhead this effort together; Just two people making a huge difference.
Poverty
plagues the streets and a growing number of street kids
are homeless and being coerced into prostitution, bonded labor
and drug trafficking as means of survival. Mozambique is a
young country and there's great poverty and few resources since
it was ravaged
by the independence war of the 1960s and 1970s, by recent
natural disasters and by the effects of extreme poverty and
AIDS.
But there is enough to build on.
Lives
are changing. People are getting saved. Street kids are
given a safe place to sleep with their bellies full of food
and clean clothes on their backs. The sick are being cared
for, the lonely are being visited and the lost are getting
saved.
YOU can be a part of God's work in Maputo.
Click here to check out the "Love Maputo" Project Photo Album on Facebook!
Maputo Project Profile: Past History
Maputo was once considered an influential hub of trade and industry. It was a beautiful city, flourishing with culture. But, the Mozambican Independence War of the 1960s and 1970s changed all that. The Mozambican Liberation Front or FRELIMO (Frente de Libertação de Moçambique) fought fiercely for their country's freedom from Portugal.
At
this time, Portugal had dominated colonies in East Africa for
470 years. The increasing number of newly independent African
nations feeling the success of the self determination
movements after WWII combined with the ongoing mistreatment of
the local Mozambican population by the Portuguese government
encouraged the growth of strong nationalist sentiments in
Mozambique. Mozambicans wanted to be free.
They were tired of being exploited in the diamond and gold mines for the sake of Portugal's desire for greater economy. They couldn't support themselves on the rice and cotton exports that they were being forced to grow. They were sick of being refused even fundamental education and minimal involvement in the government.
War
was inevitable and the fallout would be brutal.
By the time a declaration of peace finally came, it didn't seem much like peace at all. It had been 10 long years of war. The once glorious city was now in terrible disarray. Portuguese refugees fled in incredible numbers, leaving the city with not only a lack of skilled workers, but a lack of capital as well. Countless immigrants swarmed the city, rubble lay strewn across sidewalks and streets, water was gone, electricity was gone, hope was gone.
30 years later and the city is still recovering.
Maputo Project
Profile:
Current Situation
-
Mozambique is a very young country, with half of it’s members under 18 years old.1 An estimated 2 million people live in the capital city of Maputo alone, but the actual population is estimated to be much higher because of slums and other unofficial settlements.
-
Childhood doesn’t last long in Mozambique. In 2002, the ILO estimated that 31.9% of all children ages 10 to 14 years in Mozambique were already working.2 A joint Ministry of Labor and UNICEF rapid assessment survey of children under 18 working in selected areas estimated that about half of all working children began working before they reached the age of 12.3
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Poverty, lack of employment for adults, the HIV-AIDS epidemic and lack of education opportunities are among the many factors that force children to work at an early age. 4
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The number of children coerced into prostitution is growing in both rural and urban regions, particularly in Maputo.5 A large number of child victims of commercial sexual exploitation have been already been infected with HIV/AIDS.6
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With no where else to go, many children live in the streets of Maputo. Street children are reported to suffer from police beatings and sexual abuse.7
-
Mozambique has quickly become a source country for child trafficking.8
What can YOU do?
Present this need to your group and get people to act on it.
- Download "Maputo Project" PowerPoint presentation here!
- Download a "Maputo Project" poster here!
- Download "Maputo Project" pamphlet here!
- Download JESUSpolitik Powerpoint presentation here!
- Download JESUSpolitik pamphlet here!
Check out the Do Something page. Read the stories of what some regular people like you are doing to use the talents and resources they've got right here right now to touch the lives of the people of Maputo.
There are also lots and lots of activism ideas listed on the Do Something page. It's an excellent resource to show you how to use the skills and resources that you already have to reach people for the Lord.
Use what you've got and use these ideas to get students involved to help children in Africa. Learn how to put together benefit concerts, bake sales, jewelry sales, sell your junk for a cause, and much more!
Link arms with us! Add a "Love Maputo" banner to your site: If you would like to link to JESUSpolitik's Maputo Project, you may use this banner. Simply copy/paste the code that appears in the box below into the HTML code of your website.
NOTE: You do not
need to download the graphic below.
The Needs:
- Collecting donations is a simple way to make a large impact. It's a way to reach out from your world to touch theirs. Collect donations from your campus chapter, your friends, your family, your co-workers, your church or even from stores. Among the biggest needs right now are food (especially dry staples such as beans, corn meal, flour and rice), blankets, mattresses and clothes for children and adults.
- Raise funds to help support our work in Maputo. For fund-raising ideas and other ideas, hit up our Do Something page!
- Send cards, pictures and words of encouragement to Mugara, Raquel, Dave and the street kids. It can be very lonely being a kid living in the streets. You'll be surprised what a huge difference in a child's life one letter from you can make. Let them know you're praying for them. Send them to us at: P.O. Box 177 Bryans Road, MD 20616 and we'll send them over.
- Start a prayer group for the people of Maputo and for Mugara, Dave and Raquel as they help them. Let them know you are praying for them!
- Go over and be a direct part of God's work there.
- Help us buy sewing supplies for the training center. Help a former prostitute start a new life where she can sell clothes and toys instead of her body.
- Help us build the safe house for the street kids.
- Raise money for Portuguese Bibles to Maputo, Mozambique so the kids can learn about Jesus Christ in their own language.
Ways to Donate!
Because maybe you don't have a bag of rice sitting around that you could ship over, but you do have five bucks you'd like to give.
Send donations to:
JESUSpolitik
P.O. Box 177 Bryans Road, MD 20616
United States of America
* make out checks to JESUSpolitik and write "Love Maputo Project" on the note section.
Donate funds through our secured server at PayPal:
Donate funds to JESUSpolitik & the Love Maputo Project through these networks:
Join
the
Love Maputo: a JESUSpolitik project Cause on Facebook!
An easy way to raise funds, get the word out to your friends
and get more involved! Also, be sure to join the
JESUSpolitik Facebook group
Join
the
"Love Maputo" cause on Myspace! Also, be sure to be our
myspace
friend!
Donate
to JESUSpolitik and/or the Love Maputo Project on via
Guidestar!Online data base for registered U.S.
nonprofits.
Donate
to JESUSpolitik and the Maputo Project through Network
for the Good! Online data base for registered U.S.
nonprofits.
____________________________________________________________________
Resources
[1] Prevalence, Abuse & Exploitation of Street Children : Republic of Mozambique (http://www.gvnet.com/streetchildren/Mozambique.htm)
[2] World Bank, World Development Indicators 2004 [CD-ROM], Washington, D.C., 2004.
[3] Government of Mozambique, Ministry of Labor, and UNICEF, Child Labour Rapid Assessment: Mozambique (Part I), Geneva, 1999/2000, 36.
[4] U.S. Embassy - Maputo, unclassified telegram no. 1366, October 13, 2004, UNICEF, Latest News: Increasing number of orphaned children need care and support, 2003 [cited August 18, 2004]; available from http://www.unicef.org/mozambique/latest_news_12Dez03_01.htm.
[5] U.S. Dept. of Labor, Buerau of International Labor Affairs, Mozambique: Incidence and Nature of Child Labor, 2007
[6] U.S. Department of State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices- 2002: Mozambique, Washington, D.C., March 31 2003, Section 6f; available from http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2002/18217.htm. Some young prostitutes in Mozambique choose to have unprotected sex to increase their income, see HIVdent, Child Laborers at Risk for AIDS, July 25, 2001 [cited May 24, 2004]; available from http://www.hivdent.org/pediatrics/pedclarfa072001.htm. See also chapter on Mozambique in UNICEF, Child Workers in the Shadow of AIDS, 49-60.
[7] U.S. Department of State, Country Reports- 2003: Mozambique, Section 5
[8] Ibid., Section 6f. See also ECPAT International, Mozambique, [database online] January 6, 2004 [cited September 2, 2004]; available from http://www.ecpat.net/eng/Ecpat_inter/projects/monitoring/online_database/index.asp. Reliable numbers on the extent of the problem are not available, but a 2003 study reported that 1,000 women and children were trafficked from Mozambique to South Africa in 2002 to work as prostitutes, in restaurants, and on South African farms. See International Organization for Migration, The Trafficking of Women and Children in the Southern Africa Region. Presentation of Research Findings, March 24, 2003, 1 See also U.S. Department of State, Country Reports- 2003: Mozambique, Section 6f. See also U.S. Embassy - Maputo, unclassified telegram no. 126543, June 8, 2004.
For ideas, hit up our Act: Do Something page!
Let us know how it goes! Email us at feedback@jesuspolitik.com.
