Saturday, June 26, 2010

Please Help SHIP!



We love these kids. We love every single one of them. We’ve seen them grow up over the years, start school, graduate, go to college. We’ve seen them fall in love with those of you who’ve gone to El Salvador. We’ve seen their faces light up when they get their Christmas gifts from those who’ve sent them. We’ve seen the love they show each other and us, and we’ve known that in them we see Christ.

They are a family. They are our family. But, our family is in trouble.

Today we visited the orphanage and learned that the orphanage is in danger of being shut down. The government agency in charge of child welfare (CONNA) thinks there are too many problems with the orphanage. The building needs to be bigger; repairs need to be made; they need more people on staff. We have until October 15 to make that happen.

Even if all repairs are made and staff added, CONNA still believes that the building is only big enough for 15 children. There are 34 children in our family.This means that 19 of our kids will be taken from the only loving home they’ve known and placed in an impersonal, government-run orphanage.

These are children who have known physical and sexual abuse, abandonment, neglect. Many of our children have been through the government system before; some of them still carry the scars of it. We can’t let our children go back to that. We can’t look at the faces in that picture and choose who we could part with.

We need the new orphanage now—sooner than now if possible. We need $130,000 to complete construction. We need your prayers. We need to keep our family together.

http://shipinternational.org/