Dear Friends,
The very definition of charity is our willingness to engage in a heartfelt way with people who are suffering, either from dire poverty and need, or accidents, war, and natural disasters. Even if they are people you’ll never meet, there is a tangible benefit from helping that belongs to you personally. That is the universal sentiment of men and women throughout history who have engaged directly in humane action. They report a positive uplift, a feeling of being fully human and meaningfully alive.
Left: BANGLADESH—Program for feeding Rohingya refugees
Right: NIGER—Medical aid targets high infant mortality
At Conscience International we do our best to make every dollar count, to uplift widows, children, and the aged in Turkey, Guatemala, Ukraine, but especially in countries on the lower tier of the UN’s Human Development Index. Several places where we have worked for years are from that exact group of impoverished countries, including Haiti, Niger, Bangladesh, and others. Violent gangs have now made Haiti extremely dangerous. By God’s grace, our recent mission there escaped the kidnappers. Read more in Happening Now for our latest activities in Guatemala, Turkey, Haiti, and elsewhere.
Sudan, where we worked for a long time, is experiencing civil war. Odessa in Ukraine, where our teams have been working for the past 18 months, is under bombardment. DRC/Congo is too dangerous for our planned medical team to go right now. Niger and Bangladesh are experiencing coup attempts and political violence. Refugees are drowning by the hundreds in the Mediterranean. Terrorism continues its atrocities in many places. People are going hungry everywhere.
Left: HAITI—Serving children is our greatest reward
Right: Bangladesh—Political protests threaten stability
I cannot forget scenes I have witnessed in Afghanistan and Sudan--people subsisting on flour paste or stalks of bamboo and sugar cane, or as often in Niger, grasshoppers. Like you, I remain distressed by recent news that shows millions of people in the streets of those very countries where we have tried for so long to help needy individuals—Haiti, Niger, and Bangladesh, as well as Sudan and Nigeria, often fleeing from gunfire under failed political and economic systems.
Left: Niger- Military Takeover Leads to International Crisis
Right: Haiti—Gang Violence and Bloody Protests
Has today’s world arrived at a time, I wonder, as in the words of Poet W.B. Yeats, where “the best lack all conviction and the worst are full of passionate intensity?” If some of our work is putting a Band-Aid on problems, so be it. If our small team of humanitarians are engaged in responding to gigantic problems like the Ukraine War and the colossal Turkish-Syrian earthquake, what of it? Doing nothing is not an option. We in this country are blessed. Together we can make a difference. Thanks to you, we are doing what we can as effectively as possible.
We would love to hear from you,
Founder and President
Please help support one of these tax-deductible programs – in any amount— on our secure website page here or by check to: Conscience International, PO Box 1163, Alpharetta, GA 30009
THANK YOU!
