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| Pastor Sam and the 8 orphans who live with Sam and his family. |
Time to give you some new pictures so you can see our orphan children in India and the folks caring for them.
Please note that Indians believe having your picture taken is an important happening and they are taught not to smile so as not to look silly in pictures for posterity. However, we have managed to capture a few with smiles.
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| There is no school in the village where our tsunami orphans live, so we provide a teacher and the school meets in Pastor Sam's church. |
Pastor Sam and his family care for the tsunami orphans in their village near the coast of the Bay of Bengal.
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| Satish, Age 6, 2nd class (grade) |
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| Joseph, age 7, 3rd class |
Satish, Joseph and Venkatesh live in the Agape Home we built adjoining Pastor Daniel's home in Vijayawada.
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| Venkatesh, 7th class |
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| Kwandama "mom" |
Kwandama, one of the church members, cares for these children as a "mom" to them. Pastor Daniel and his wife Esther are around to oversee and help as needed. Esther, God bless her, does all the cooking for the children as well as her own family and some church children that they have taken in to feed and educate.
We believe that love and nurturing in a family environment are important!
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| Raja |
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| Babi |
Education is foundational as is the love and care of a whole church community where they live.
Several of our children have graduated already and have gone on to college or even graduated college.
Two of our orphans in Vijayawada, Raja and Babi, are currently receiving partial support from us as they work their way through college on India's equivalent of work-study.
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| Most of the original 54 tsunami orphans newly found. |
We initially began caring for orphans after the tsunami hit the coast of Andhra Pradesh in December of 2004.
We started with 54 children. Thankfully, Pastor Sam and his family were able to find relatives for many of the children and the numbers dwindled little by little as the children have grown up. Several have gone on to another Christian ministry that has a highschool for the village children.
Now we are caring for eight of those original children and 3 additional children in Vijayawada along with supporting three pastor's children.
We are supporting these three pastor's children so that they may attend Christian school.
All state schools in India are Hindu and teach the Hindu religion intertwined with everything they do.
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| Grace, age 9, 6th class |
Most pastors in India have a very difficult time supporting their familes because most Christians are very poor and are treated as even lower than the lowest of castes among the Hindus. It is difficult for them to get good jobs in a Hindu society unless they have education.
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| Jessi, age 4, Kindergarden | | | |
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We are happy to be able to help these children receive an education in a school where Christ is honored. They are also learning English which will help them in the future. Grace and Jessi will both be going into full
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| Santhi, age 5, first class |
time ministry following their parents into ministry. Santhi plans to go to college and get a good job to help support the family and the ministry.
Thanks to all of you who are supporting financially and in prayer. These children are blessed because of Jesus and YOU.
If you're new to Full Circle and want to know how to help the orphans just send me a note at directorfcmi@sbcglobal.net or call 608-577-fcmi (6432) and ask for Sherry.
