Nicaragua Mission 2017 - Part Three, How We Help
Nicaragua Mission Trip 2017
We had a wonderful visit and mission exchange in June with our friends at El Porvenir. This is the last in a series of posts about the trip. See links at the end of this post to catch up!
Also, for some background and more info on our partnership with El Porvenir please check out the June 2017 edition of the church's newsletter, Sixth Sense.
The mission team: Our group of six included David Rothenberg, Sara Berg, and Jenny Newman (that's me!) from Sixth Presbyterian Church. Also along for the journey were Jennifer Novelli, Executive Director of Building New Hope, and her son, Alessandro. Mark Swift, a member of First Presbyterian Church in Washington, Pa., joined us for the adventure. We were excited to be joined by Building New Hope board member Therese Tardio during our time at El Porvenir.
On a warm and sunny morning at El Porvenier, we met with Rene and some of the community's elders in the office of the Co-OP. They wanted to share with us their appreciation or our church's support. They presented us with a report of what our donations were used for. The Community of El Porvenir received $1,000 from Sixth Church in 2016 through the church’s Church & Community committee allocations. Financial Transparency is very important to the elders and leaders of the community. A ledger is kept in the CO-OP’s Financial Office and receipts and payments are meticulously documented. - Improvements and renovations to the Main House at El Porvenir. The structure is 96 years old and serves and the office, gathering place, location of the coffee sorting and storage, housing for visiting groups. Our friend’s report that this has been a long and difficult renovation due to size of the structure and they type of hard wood that is used in the it’s construction.
- Rebuilding of the gazebo at the lookout point on the top of the mountain. The structure collapsed in 2015 and Sixth Church donations have made it possible to reconstruct this structure.
- A railing was added to the long, concrete steps of the Main House making trips to the outhouse and other places down below safer.
- Funding from Sixth Church Donations have made it possible for the community to maintain a medical fund. Members of the community are able to borrow from that fund in case of medical emergencies and pay it back at no interest.
The leaders of El Porvenir were very happy to receive our contributions which will allow them get parts and begin to fix a broken water pump which is a much needed and anticipated repair.
Previous posts about the trip:
Nicaragua Mission Trip 2017 - Part 1
Nicaragua Mission Trip 2017 - Part 2
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