Diptipur update

  Dr Samson Das worked hard on Diptipur’s behalf during his first week back in India after his visit to England.  First, he had a long discussion in Cuttack with Bishop C.K.Das, of the Diocese of Sambalpur (Diptipur is in his diocese), who is now going to support the hospital.
  Samson also had a long discussion in Cuttack with Dr Rajnish Samal, Director of Diptipur, and together they identified the primary needs of the hospital to bring it to its full potential.
  The most important meeting is being held on 21st & 22nd April, when Samson is in Diptipur.  There, together with Bishop C.K.Das, Dr Rajnish Samal and Dr V. Henry, he will discuss and determine the future of the hospital.  It is an exciting time for us and I would particularly ask for your prayers for this meeting.
  Dr Samson Das also met Dr Sanjeebit Jachuck in Cuttack to share his experiences of England and, especially, his visit to St Albans.
  You may remember that Dr. Jachuck spends September to March of each year in India.  This time, he has visited Diptipur to give his appraisal of the situation.  He has a wide experience of medical matters in both England and India; is keenly following the results of the meetings concerning the future of Diptipur, and he has written the following overview of the situation:

‘The light is on Diptipur
  ‘It all started with a nudge from Aileen just before I left for India.  Before I realised it, the Rev Dr.Samson Das was here to hear from you about Diptipur.  He was so impressed that he went out of his way to approach the Authority with a plea to let Diptipur have a General Surgeon, an Eye Surgeon and a car to facilitate the hospital.
  ‘It has also been brought to the attention of the Christian Medical Association of India that Diptipur is not alone to face such crises.  The Association, along with the World Council of Churches, is reviewing the issues of sustainability of these hospitals.
  ‘The health records in Orissa, India, are the worst in South East Asia.  The challenges, needs and demands are beyond our imagination. Nothing short of a miracle can transform them.  Two Baptist missionaries set a lamp burning in Diptipur some 60 years ago.  Today, India’s Ministry of Health has started developing rural health programmes and the Government of Orissa has recently introduced a health programme around Diptipur. 
‘Let us continue our unfailing prayers to keep the lamp burning in Diptipur.  Let the Light so shine before men that it will glorify our Father in Heaven.’

By Aileen Hagen.

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Chus helping

  'We have more hurricanes and floods than we used to.  I've lived here all my life and, now, strong winds and big waves from the sea cause more floods,” said Dominica Echevarría.
Her brother, Jesús Antonio ‘Chus’ Echevarría, 15, lives with Dominica and her husband in the San Luis la Herradura area of El Salvador - an area prone to natural disasters.  Hurricanes are a growing threat, and the low-lying land is susceptible to flooding. 
  Chus' father is dead and he sees his mother only occasionally. He has been brought up by his sister and her husband. The family live in three huts close together.  Chus shares a hut with his brother and the family's livestock.  This hut was battered by Hurricane Stan in 2005 and, as a result, still has holes in the roof.  The family survives on just a few dollars a day.
Involved with his community, Chus - in return for some food - has worked on the local river bank with Christian Aid partner, Aprodehni. In the aftermath of Hurricane Stan, he helped to make up food parcels for other families.
  Chus is not the only member of his family to be involved with Aprodehni.  His sister and brother-in-law play an active part in analysing what needs to be done in the community, organising working groups, and carrying out practical work on the river bank and drainage channels.
  Even his seven-year-old cousin, Jackeline, participates in Aprodehni's workshops, which use sport and art to help children forget the trauma of hurricanes and earthquakes.  She has also taken part in rubbish-collecting brigades.
  Aprodehni encourages people to get involved in, and take responsibility for, protecting and developing their communities.  Its work includes reducing the risks created by natural disasters, reducing environmental pollution and responding to emergencies.
  The increased frequency and intensity of hurricanes and subsequent flooding demonstrate the catastrophic effects that climate change is having on some of the world's poorest people.  Archbishop Oscar Romero memorably referred to the 80 per cent of El Salvadoreans living in poverty as a 'crucified people'.  Chus is just one of these 'crucified people'.  Yet, with the help of Aprodehni, he is helping to save lives.  Although he is poor, he is helping people to adapt to climate change and to live with the effects of natural disasters.

From www.caweek.org.

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Fairtrade’s £300m boom aids the poor

  Sales of Fairtrade goods in Britain have risen by nearly 50 per cent in a year.
Shoppers spent £290m on the ethically traded products last year, a 46 per cent increase on 2005. Sales are already on course to exceed £300m this year.
  Nonetheless, activists claim that they need even more support to make the world a fairer place for some of the world's poorest farmers.
  Fairtrade products guarantee a set minimum price for producers.  They also pay a premium which must be set aside for social projects, such as providing water tanks for a farmer's community.
  The scheme is run by the Fairtrade Foundation, which licenses the 2,500 products, - from tea and coffee to yoghurt and bananas - which carry the Fairtrade mark.
  Executive director Harriet Lamb has said that Fairtrade is moving from an 'optional extra' to a 'must-do' for shoppers.  She added: “The challenge now is to take it to the next level.”
Lamb is to ask a committee of MPs for a £50m investment in Fairtrade from the international community.
  Ben Clowney, of the Christian charity, Tearfund, is to live on Fairtrade foods for a fortnight to flag up the product range.
  The supermarket giant Sainsbury has said that it is switching all its bananas to ‘Fairtrade’. Waitrose said it hoped to double Fairtrade sales in its stores.

Spotted in The Metro by Aneurin Little.

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Lebanese lifeline

  Lebanese Baptists are in talks with the United Nations over a pioneering scheme to help refugees fleeing from conflict-ridden Iraq.
  Up to 200 Lebanese Baptist Society (LBS) staff could be involved in the project as early as next month.  The aim would be to provide counselling, education, shelter and basic food supplies.
  Last summer, Lebanese Baptists housed some 800 people who lost their homes in the Israeli bombing raids on Beirut.

From The Baptist Times.

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BMS relief grants

  BMS World Mission has recently made the following relief grants:
* Indonesia: £21,000 to help survivors of the earthquake in Java in May 2006 - supplying food, water and medicines; temporary housing and, finally, building 25 new homes and repairing 20 others.
* North Korea: £15,000 for 250,000 packs of high-vitamin soya milk for children in the city of Sariwon’s baby home, orphanage and paediatric hospital.

From BMS World News.

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The image of religion

  My favourite religious joke goes like this.  A Buddhist monk goes into a pizza parlour.  The waiter asks him what he’d like on his pizza and the monk replies: “Make me one with everything.”
  Perhaps it’s characteristic of the ‘post 9/11 world’ that there are those who would suggest that I am politically incorrect for telling that joke.
  But what is this post 9/11 world?  If everything has really changed then a logical conclusion has to be that, whatever else we might think of it, radical Islam’s attack on the Twin Towers was a fantastic piece of international communication.
  I don’t agree.  Rather, 9/11 was a symptom not a cause of the changed world.
  The Church of England is riven with the effects of brand marketing.  Many evangelicals argue that the church ‘only needs the gospel’ with which to communicate itself but this takes us into dangerous territory.
  On one level, it leads to selling faith as a product or a lifestyle, when faith is, itself, a communications methodology.
  Take Clark’s Shoes as a secular analogy for the church.  Some 20 years ago, Clark’s suffered from internecine strife that distracted it from what it was meant to be doing.  It still had strong core values but it had lost its way and had missed an entire generation in the process.  Janet Street-Porter was on record as saying that Clark’s shoes were something your mother would buy for you but which you wouldn’t choose yourself.
  Clark’s recovered by coming out of denial and accepting that the old market was not going to return.  Second, it applied its core values to the culture and context of today.  Then - and only then - did it address its marketing.  All too often, marketing and communications are put at the start of the process.
  As churches, we have to accept that ‘Christendom’ is over - but Christians can still be a national conscience. They must ‘live faith’ rather than ‘do church’.
  Next, we must inculturate the core values of a living faith into our communications with others of different nationalities and cultures.
  The alternatives are too horrible to contemplate because Christian churches have already developed dangerous fundamentalisms of their own.
  Fundamentalism - be it in Islam, Judaism or Christianity - is not the same as orthodoxy.  Fundamentalism is a politicised and radicalised alternative to religion that emerges from secular insecurities.  Orthodox religions need to de-code and challenge what the fundamentalists are saying.  Otherwise, we’re in danger of developing narrow, western fundamentalisms of our own.  And that way lies madness for our children.

Abridged by Robert Little, from an article in ‘Profile’, the magazine of the Chartered Institute of Public Relations, by George Pitcher, founder partner of the Luther Pendragon PR agency and now an Anglican clergyman.