The Kidmia Foundation | Archive

Orphan Sunday Helps “Defend the Fatherless”

Without help and support from others, many of Ethiopia’s five million orphaned children end up on their own. It’s a tragic reality that many Americans cannot imagine.

One of Kidmia’s primary goals is to reunite orphaned and vulnerable children with their relatives. There are often financial constraints that stand in the way, so many of our efforts also involve helping family members acquire the resources and skills they need to provide for these children. Involving the local church in Ethiopia is crucial to the success of these efforts.

On November 6th, as part of an Orphan Sunday initiative, more than 5,500 people at eight different Ethiopian churches heard the message of Isaiah 1:17. Following singing songs of worship and praying for the orphan crisis, Aschalew Abebe, Kidmia’s Ethiopian Director, encouraged local church members to “defend the cause of the fatherless and plead the case of the widow” and take a more active role in helping orphaned children and widows.

The purpose of Orphan Sunday was to increase awareness about the orphan crisis, pray for the children, collect financial support, and present biblical encouragement and evidence for these principles. In all, church members donated 4,500 Ethiopian Birr (approximately $270 US) to help local children plus more than 10,000 Birr ($580 US) worth of material resources like clothing, school bags, lunch boxes, and other school supplies. Many donors committed to continue their financial support in the future.

Volunteers came forward representing more than 15 professions, including medical doctors, nurses, social workers, and psychologists, who agreed to donate their time as well.

Another important aspect of the day was to recognize and encourage efforts that had already begun. For instance, one church in Addis Ababa currently provides food, clothing, and educational materials to 27 orphans, 4 widows, and 3 elderly individuals. Kidmia is encouraging these ministries to grow so more people in the area can receive assistance through the local church.

The churches involved in Orphan Sunday partnered with Kidmia in the recently implemented Seed Adoption Project, and they are all working in various areas of orphan ministry. Abebe hopes to increase the number of churches involved with Kidmia in the future.

Kidmia is making significant progress in connecting with and educating the local community about the orphan crisis through efforts like Orphan Sunday. US contributions currently support our Gunchire Center, which cares for 25 children living at the center and an additional 65 who are living with family in the community.

Our ultimate goal is for this first center in Gunchire to become self-sufficient so that financial support can be directed to expand to other areas in Ethiopia and reach greater numbers of orphaned and vulnerable children. That’s why Orphan Sunday is so important and the reason Abebe hopes to involve even more churches in future initiatives. He is pleased with the overall results of this event and wants to continue to spread this message. “We should make this part of our individual and corporate worship and our daily life,’’ he says.

A Recap of Seed Adoption: Ethiopia

Seed Adoption: Ethiopia took place June 2011 in Addis Ababa, Nazareth, and Awassa, 3 of the largest and most strategic cities in Ethiopia. By God’s grace, the Kidmia Foundation, in collaboration with The Evangelical Churches Fellowship of Ethiopia and the Ethiopian Full Gospel Believers Church, and with the help of our 20+ partnered organizations, made Seed Adoption a reality. In addition, in less than 3 months our U.S. supporters – including adoptive families, small groups, and churches – raised close to $30,000 to fund the effort, enabling 530 church leaders to travel and be trained in the message of gospel+adoption+church at no cost.

Together we explored the scope and complexity of the orphan crisis in Ethiopia, its major causes and consequences, existing practices to address the problem, the biblical and theological basis for orphan care and adoption, and the role of the church in addressing the crisis. Those attending said:

“I believe we witnessed the spark that will soon become a flame across the country for indigenous adoption in Ethiopia, and it is being led by the Christian church!”
“I know believe that God will use local adoption in Ethiopia to can change the story of our nation.”
“God has raised up Seed Adoption with a great and different vision to reach children who have no families, guardians, or caregivers.”
“With what we’ve now been given, God will use our city to be a model for our nation in how to address the orphan crisis.”
“It was a lot like watching a president’s victorious speech on election night, or maybe how it must have felt to witness Lincoln unveiling the Emancipation Proclamation. In a few years, I believe we’ll look back on the Seed Adoption conference…and see it as nothing less than the spark of a national spiritual and cultural transformation for adoption and the orphan. It just might have been the beginning of the end of the Ethiopian orphan crisis.”

Read more about our ongoing efforts and the response in Ethiopia:

Introducing SEED ADOPTION

We are very excited to announce a great effort in which Kidmia will be taking part. In partnership with The Rooted Church, The Idea Camp, Together for Adoption, and the Christian Alliance for Orphans, as well as a host of ministries and organizations in Ethiopia, Kidmia will be playing a pivotal role in Seed Adoption.

Seed Adoption is a pastoral training workshop that brings together influential pastors of evangelical churches from across a country to discuss (1) the plight of orphaned and vulnerable children, (2) a Biblical perspective centered on the gospel, adoption, and the local church, and (3) appropriate strategies to bring holistic and lasting change to the lives of orphaned children, all for the glory of God.

We believe that the gospel, when understood and applied, must work through the local church and in the lives of Christians to effect such change. Therefore, in order to help address the orphan crisis, the Seed Adoption training aims to create, maintain, and encourage a national conversation with the indigenous church.

Seed Adoption 2011: Ethiopia

Three two-day workshops will be held in June 2011 in 3 strategic cities: Addis Ababa (Ethiopiaʼs capital city), Nazareth (capital of the Oromiya Region), and Awassa (Capital of Southern Nations Nationalities and Regional State). A total of 500 people will attend the workshops: 250 influential senior pastors and their wives. All 9 of Ethiopiaʼs regional states will be represented.

You Can Help!

Visit Seed Adoption to learn more about the orphan crisis, Ethiopia, the training, and our partners. Additionally, YOU can help bring local adoption to Ethiopian churches. Just $70 covers ALL expenses for a local pastor and his wife to attend the Seed Adoption training. Click here for more.

Kidmia Featured in The High Calling

The High Calling is an online community providing articles on every day conversations about work, life, and God. Recently Amber Haines wrote a great piece On Loving the Orphan, in which she talks about her family’s experience with Kidmia. An excerpt:

The more we considered their plight, the more deeply we fell in love with an entire people group, an entire population of mothers. It was in this place of connection and love that we began to empathize with those Ethiopian mothers who felt the tension between motherhood and giving their children up for adoption. We knelt in humility, asking our Creator, “is there a way to allow these Ethiopian mothers the graceful dignity of raising their own daughters?”

Wrestling with our own tension, we became aware of an organization led by Ethiopian nationals called Kidmia that is tackling the root causes of poverty and vulnerability in rural Ethiopia—an organization seeking to help at-risk Ethiopian families stay intact. Their approach answered our questions.

Read the whole article here.

Semeret’s Story

Semeret on September 20, 2010 – the day of her admission to Kidmia

Seven month old Semeret was abandoned by her father and lived with her mother until the day she too left her behind. Because of economic problems, her mother took her to a friend’s house, disappeared, and never returned. She could simply not afford to provide the care and support her only daughter so desperately needed.

The case was reported to the Woreda Women and Children Affairs Office, and Semeret was handed over to the Head of the office, Ms. Kebu Guma. Just seven months old, Semeret weighed only 8 pounds. She was highly malnourished and in critical condition with a respiratory tract infection, diarrhea, skin allergies, and an intestinal parasite.

Government officials believed Semeret’s condition to be hopeless, and they expected her death within a short time. But Ms. Kebu Guma brought Semeret to Kidmia’s Child Transition Center in the town of Gunchire, trusting that Kidmia was the only organization that could save Semeret’s life.

Ms. Kebu Guma handing over Semeret to Nurse Yewubdar Assefa, Kidmia’s Project Nurse

Kidmia’s country director, project director, and project nurse discussed Semeret’s critical condition, put their trust in the saving grace of God, and gave joint approval for her to be admitted to the Transition Center. After completing all the requirements with the Woreda Women and Children Affairs Office, Semeret was admitted to Kidmia Children’s Transition Center on September 20, 2010.

Immediately after her admission Semeret received a general health check and started to receive intensive and comprehensive medical care by the project nurse. The project care givers also provided intensive nutrition and physical care to enable her to recover fully and completely within the shortest possible time.

Now God has changed everything for good. Now Semeret has a completely different story. She is fully recovered from her sickness. Her total body weight is over 19 pounds – normal for her age and height. She has fully recovered from all kinds of diseases and has regained her normal skin color. It is a pleasure to see Semeret smiling and giving happiness and joy to others.

God is so generous to give us a chance to serve such precious children and to save their lives and prepare them for the future. It is encouraging to see a dear child coming out of a dire situation and enjoy God’s love and mercy.

Kidmia is working hard to tell this story again and again in all its operational areas with the transforming grace of the Lord, generous gifts from our donors, and the strong commitment and hard work of our staff.

There are many more stories like Semeret’s

AIDS is one of the most serious threats to development in Ethiopia. About 56,000 people die from AIDS each year, leaving more and more children as orphans. Within Ethiopia, 5 million children – around 5% of the total population – are categorized as orphans or vulnerable children. Out of these, over 850,000 are orphaned as a result of the death of one or both parents due to HIV/AIDS. Orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) are faced with an increased risk of psychological distress, economic hardships, exploitation, trafficking, and HIV infection. Many young children stay home to take care of a sick relative or must work in order to provide an income for their families. Due to these challenges, OVC are less likely to attend and complete school even at the basic levels, which makes their future unpromising.

Kidmia has developed a comprehensive program to meet the nutritional, medical, educational, psychological, and spiritual needs of OVC and provides economic opportunity for extended and adoptive families to enable children to be reunified or adopted by local families. Please consider helping Kidmia in its efforts to serve these wonderful children, who truly are among the “least of these.”

Aschalew to Speak at Idea Camp

Kidmia will be featured at The Idea Camp, a collaborative movement happening February 25-26 in Northwest Arkansas. Aschalew Abebe, our in-country director, will be a featured guide at the Camp.

The theme of the Camp is “Orphan Hope.” If you’re in the NW Arkansas area, come visit us!

Cook Children’s Teams Up with Kidmia

Kidmia is committed to providing holistic support for orphaned and vulnerable – including medical attention and health care. Recently Cook Children’s Hospital in Fort Worth partnered with Kidmia to address the health needs of children. The result was a mini-clinic being established on the Gunchire campus in Ethiopia, with medical equipment graciously provided by Cook Children’s.

(Part of the Kidmia team meeting Dr. Siu at Cook Children’s Hospital in Forth Worth)

(Medical equipment donated by Cook Children’s Hospital to Kidmia Gunchire Children Transition Center)

As a result, Kidmia and the local district health office are working jointly in creating awareness on general health, environmental sanitation and personal hygiene, malaria prevention and control, HIV/AIDs prevention and control, and the prevention of water born diseases. The strong partnership between Kidmia and the health office is bringing remarkable changes in the overall health awareness within the community.

Aschalew’s Visit to the U.S.

He has traveled all over the world, but this fall was Aschalew Abebe’s first visit to the United States. Kidmia’s Ethiopian Director arrived in Dallas on September 24th, and during his 15-day tour, he visited with local churches in Texas and Arkansas and attended the Together for Adoption Conference in Austin where he led a breakout session called: Creating Hope for the Orphan through Indigenous, Local Church-Based Holistic Ministry. He also spoke at several vision-casting dinner events held in homes across the DFW Metroplex to acquaint local Christians with Kidmia’s model for addressing the orphan crisis in Ethiopia and around the world.

I had the opportunity to meet and share a meal with Aschalew at one of the dinner events about halfway through his trip. If you ever have a chance to speak with him personally, I promise you, he’ll knock your socks off. He is deeply committed to effectively loving and serving orphaned and vulnerable children while not discounting the needs of the surrounding community or ignoring the causes that contributed to the orphan crisis in the first place.

Aschalew has dozens of stories to share about ways God has intervened in his life and the lives of people he’s encountered through the years. I heard some of those stories as we talked for two hours one morning during his visit. He also shared his perspective on how we—with God’s help—can be part of the solution and be changed in the process. Here’s a quick summary:

Awareness is Growing—Americans are beginning to grasp the severity of the international orphan crisis and are starting to do something about it. Families who have adopted are willing to sacrifice their time and, really, give their lives to care for orphaned children.
It’s Not about Money—this isn’t just an “orphan issue” we’re dealing with. It’s children’s lives and that requires a life-long commitment. Aschalew’s wasn’t just about raising money for facilities, it was about engaging others in the conversation and encouraging personal awareness and involvement to address children’s needs today, tomorrow and for their lifetime.

Consider the Cause as Well as the Effect—HIV/AIDS, divorce, unplanned pregnancy, rape, and polygamy are as much a part of the orphan crisis as the economic issues that break up families. The local church must be involved with the community and the government to address prevention issues and provide counsel for the youth and education for all.

It’s Not What, but How and Why We Give—The heart with which we give matters to God. To quote Aschalew: “If you give something small with love and concern it will change people’s lives.” Unspoken, but implicit in the stories he told, giving with love and concern will change your life as well.

Under Aschalew’s very capable leadership, Kidmia is serving:

Children – Each week two evangelists coordinate a bible study (Wednesday), worship (Sunday) and prayer time (Friday) for the children at the Transition Center.

Families – When local families report difficulty caring for a child, Christian families organize in the church to help out. Kidmia provides training based on the needs, capacity, interest and experience for parents who are looking for income and employment.

The Community – Building relationships in the community means greater collaboration and less competition. Kidmia is a liaison between the church and the government to bring groups together to discuss common issues (like HIV).

The Church – Kidmia has a relationship with four local churches and would like to support two evangelists from each (8 total) who can visit and pray for families, meet the spiritual needs of the children at the Transitional Center and provide outreach into the Muslim community. Already, more than 3,800 people have heard the Good News and 428 have come to receive Jesus Christ as their personal Savior and Lord since Kidmia’s inception.

Kidmia’s Plans for the Future

The Regional, Zonal and Woreda government offices recently conducted an assessment of Kidmia and in their report called the project “relevant to the needs of the target beneficiaries, effective in contributing towards the achievement of its intended goals and objectives, efficient in its utilization of financial, material and manpower resources, and exemplary in working towards ensuring sustainability of the project and its impacts through:

Capacity building and vocational training,
Family empowerment components,
Implementation of income and food generation activities in the center,
Mobilization of the target families, communities and governmental and nongovernmental organizations to provide comprehensive and integrated care and support services to OVC, and
Transferring the required skills and knowledge to the local people.”

Given this recognition and the widespread support of the community, local churches, government and NGO’s, Kidmia has named several specific goals for the coming year:

Increase the number of children that can be supported in the community and at the Transition Center
Invest in socio-economic empowerment of families in order that they can better care for their own children (food production/income generation)
Establish a mini-clinic in the Center (because the hospital is a great distance away)
Grow partnerships with existing governmental offices at all levels and NGOs
Document and share best practices with others
Reunify ten children with their families
Create awareness in the church and community
Build capacity – small business development/management
Provide training on product marketing for handicrafts, woodwork/furniture, household items, spices, handbags, jewelry, etc.
Expand Kidmia’s campus to house more children
Establish wood workshop to provide vocational skills to adults and children
Established a demonstration site for the model farm
Organize a self-help accountability group for microfinance and savings promotion
Create access to microfinance – provide seed money/initial capital for small businesses through:
- Government loans
- Loans from World Vision (WISDOM microfinance)
- Establish revolving loans through Kidmia – in which many people can borrow same money at different times as funds are repaid

Your personal involvement truly matters to Kidmia. If you would like to learn more about any of these projects, please contact us. Our greatest need is for monthly ongoing contributions to facilitate lasting change in the lives of orphaned and vulnerable children in rural Ethiopia. Please give today.

25 Minutes with Kidmia

Earlier this month, Kidmia’s Ethiopian director Aschalew Abebe spoke on the orphan crisis and Christian living at Well Communities, The Rooted Church, Christ Chapel Bible Church, and Watermark Community Church. You can listen below to his 25 minute talk at Watermark entitled “Love, Give, Serve.”

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Seed Adoption 2011: Ethiopia

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