Church raises $6 million for tsunami relief, but need continues
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A UMNS photo by Mike DuBose Students
at St. Bernard Academy, a Catholic school in Nashville, Tenn., pack
health kits for the United Methodist Committee on Relief.
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Students
at St. Bernard Academy, a Catholic school in Nashville, Tenn., pack
health kits for the United Methodist Committee on Relief. The kits are
intended for victims of the Dec. 26 tsunami in South Asia. The school's
outreach was part of its observance of the Week of Prayer for Christian
Unity. A UMNS photo by Mike DuBose. Photo #05-099, 1/25/05 |
Jan. 26, 2005By Linda Bloom* NEW
YORK (UMNS) — As Indonesian officials once again increased the
estimated death toll from the Dec. 26 tsunami, United Methodists
continued their efforts to assist the survivors. The
denomination raised $6 million for relief work by Jan. 25. The United
Methodist Committee on Relief is encouraging church members to continue
making cash donations and collecting health and school kits and medicine
boxes for shipment to South Asia. Church
members from Indiana and Missouri also have pledged to rebuild two
Methodist churches damaged by the tsunami — providing additional space
for community centers and clinics — in the Indonesian cities of Banda
Aceh and Meulaboh. BBC
News reported Jan. 25 that Indonesia’s health minister, Fadilah Supari,
estimated more than 220,000 died or were missing and presumed dead
because of the tsunami and preceding earthquake. A United Methodist
delegation recently visited Aceh Province in northern Sumatra, where
most of the destruction occurred, carrying donations of medicine with
them. The
new estimate brings the total killed in 12 countries throughout the
region – including Sri Lanka, India and Thailand – to more than 280,000. Many
of the survivors are homeless. Methodists in Indonesia are providing
aid to the 8,671 internally displaced people living in 11 camps around
the town of Bireuen. Children account for more than a quarter of the
camp residents. Working
with the Indonesian Methodist Church, UMCOR plans to assist with
cleanup in the Banda Aceh and Meulaboh areas, offer grief counseling and
pastoral care, and embark on a pilot program for house replacement. In
Sri Lanka, the agency expects to work with Methodists on
community-based projects that also help restore lost income for
residents. UMCOR’s partner in India, Churches Auxiliary for Social
Action, already has provided emergency food and supplies to some 50,000
families and plans to build more than 800 temporary shelters. CASA has
applied for approval to rebuild housing in 24 villages. UMCOR
has worked in partnership with Church World Service on the delivery of
health and school kits to tsunami-damaged areas. Kristin Sachen, an
UMCOR executive, said the ecumenical relief agency is anticipating
making such deliveries for at least nine more months. "We will be
helping them with the kits," she added. Church
World Service has been active in the region for more than 20 years and
has more than 100 staff members in Indonesia, with offices in Medan,
Banda Aceh and Jakarta. The relief agency’s Pakistan emergency response
team has been helping its longtime partner, the National Christian
Council of Sri Lanka, respond to needs in that country. As
part of Action by Churches Together – a global alliance that also
includes UMCOR and Church World Service – the National Christian Council
is coordinating medical assistance to 10 camps for displaced people
around Batticaloa, Sri Lanka. Five of the camps are in church buildings,
with about 1,800 lodged in the Methodist church. Donated
kits are processed at UMCOR’s Sager Brown Depot in Baldwin, La. Gwen
Redding, director of Sager Brown, reported that, as of Jan. 25, some
36,000 health kits already had been dispatched to the Church World
Service warehouse in Maryland for shipment to the tsunami region. The
health kits focus on personal hygiene as a method of improving overall
health. Each kit contains a hand towel, washcloth, comb, nail file, bar
of soap, toothbrush, toothpaste and six adhesive bandages, sealed in a
one-gallon plastic bag. School
kits contain ruled paper, blunt scissors, an eraser, a ruler, six
pencils, a pencil sharpener, crayons and construction paper. Instructions for the kits can be found at gbgm-umc.org/umcor/print/kits online. Each
medicine box contains both over-the-counter and prescription medicines,
enough to treat 1,000 people for about three months. Information can be
found at gbgm-umc.org/health/medbox for organizing the boxes. Monetary
donations to UMCOR’s "South Asia Emergency" relief efforts can be
placed in local church offering plates or sent directly to UMCOR, 475
Riverside Drive, Room 330, New York, NY 10115. Designate checks for
UMCOR Advance #274305 and "South Asia Emergency." Credit-card donations
can be made online at www.methodistrelief.org or by calling (800) 554-8583. *Bloom is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in New York. News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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