On arrival at CBCH, each child comes with a unique story of sorrow and loss. With your help we are able to create a new common narrative full of security, love and potential. Here are two examples of hope restored.
Jacob began life ‘in the rural’, the youngest of six children. Sadly, he never knew his father who tragically took his own life, and he lost his mother when he was eight, along with his grandparents. The next couple of years were a blur of pain and upheaval, moving from place to place, scrounging food and a place to sleep where he could. Education was a hopeless dream.
He remembers the joy of coming home to CBCH when he was 10: the security of a home, daily food, a bed, and being loved and cared for. He was able to resume his education, doing well enough at primary school to gain a place at secondary school and eventually, college, completing his Diploma in Health this year and hoping for a scholarship to proceed to a Degree in Community Health.
Rather emotionally he speaks of losing his faith after his mother died but finding it again at CBCH and making a firm commitment to follow Jesus when he was 11, subsequently leading the Christian Union at secondary school. Thank you for making it possible for Jacob to escape from a life of hopelessness to one of promise.
Iscalline’s mother was a single parent, dying when Iscalline was just seven, so she was raised by her grandparents. Extreme poverty meant that the grandparents were unable to send her to school – in fact their existence was so deprived that the local chief and social services referred her to CBCH. She has grown to love the Home of CBCH. Maths is her favourite subject at school and she would like to be a Math’s teacher when she grows up.
This demur and diminutive eleven year old especially likes the church services held at the Home because she has the opportunity sometimes to lead the service. Iscalline, like Jacob, remains deeply grateful for the open door at CBCH that has enabled her to escape from a future with little hope to one of boundless possibilities.
