APRIL CAMPAIGN

Send Tea Farmers’ Children to School

Over the years, YOU have been able to uplift the children of tea farmers in Bangladesh and give them the life-changing opportunity of a quality Catholic education. Now, more than ever, they need your devotion! Despite challenges, including tragic flooding that occurred in the country last year, the children continue to stay persistent in their studies. YOU can help 250 children lift themselves out of poverty and into brighter futures.

The tea farmers in Sylhet perform intense physical labor for extremely little pay. Along with the heartbreaking living conditions, these hard-working parents struggle to afford the necessities for their children. Education is little more than a dream. However, your bountiful generosity has been changing this area over the years!

Catholic World Mission and the Diocese of Sylhet have collaborated over the years to provide two primary schools in the area with the resources and support they need. The schools teach children in their native languages and provide extracurricular activities that enrich the children’s lives. Best of all, they train the children in the Catholic faith, teaching them values, leadership, and responsibility. Very few Catholics live in the Sylhet area, but the Indigenous peoples — especially children — are eager to hear the Word of God.

“[The children] feel happy when they come to school. These children need continuous support to complete their primary education and future growth of their life.” – Father Jacob J. Finney, OMI, the Sylhet Catholic Diocese, Bangladesh

YOU gave the tea farmers and their families support during the flooding that provided them with the basic necessities to survive. As they continue to recover from the natural disaster, they are especially grateful for your generosity.” The diocese is doing everything it can to take this community forward with limited resources. Your generosity will truly make a difference in the lives of many hard-working and devoted families.

“We thank God for our generous donors who are journeying with us to bring a better future for these poor and deprived children.” – Father Jacob J. Finney, OMI, the Sylhet Catholic Diocese, Bangladesh

Any amount you give will combine with the gifts of your fellow Catholic World Mission supporters to ensure that 250 children of Sylhet have the opportunity to complete their education and break the cycle of poverty.

“We always pray for you, and our children continuously pray for their benefactors,” Diocese of Sylhet Bishop Shorot Francis Gomes says. “We hope and believe that you will continue to support us for the year 2023 so that we may offer this pastoral care to our underprivileged children.”

Give again today and help them know the Lord and reach their full potential.

END OF APRIL 2023 CAMPAIGN

Catholic Charity Work In Bangladesh

Bangladesh won its independence from West Pakistan in 1971, and is governed by a parliamentary republic style of government. Bangladesh is the eighth-most-populous country in the world, and is slightly smaller than Iowa. It’s located between India and Myanmar (Burma), and in 2017, saw a major influx of refugees from Myanmar as a result of religious persecution there. Most Bangladeshis are Muslim (89.1%), while 10% are Hindu, and just 0.9% identify as “other,” which includes Buddhists and Christians.
Read through the tabs below to learn more about the ways you can bring hope by donating to Catholic charity work in Bangladesh and change the lives of hundreds of people

Tea Kids: Give Education to Tea Farmers’ Children

Bangladesh - Stats for the Diocese of Sylhet and Bangladesh tea farms
Tea workers are one of South Asia’s most deprived communities in terms of fair wages, access to education, healthcare, nutrition, and other basic human needs.

At first glance, the lush greenery of the tea plantations of Bangladesh seems beautiful. “This is God’s country,” you might think if you ever visit there. But life in these tea plantations has a dark underside, and a closer look reveals deep suffering.

Tea laborers work long hours plucking, carrying, and weighing tea leaves. They earn only $1.00 USD per day.

When they go home at night, it’s to residences called “labor lines”—row upon row of tiny mud-and-aluminum huts, where they live with their families. The labor line huts have only one or two rooms, no running water, and limited access to clean water and sanitation. Disease runs rampant.

Most tea laborers are illiterate. Many of them were born in the tea plantation and have lived their whole lives there. They’ve never had access to quality education—tea plantations don’t provide good schools because students might get big ideas, and dream of a better life, and leave the tea garden.

Tea workers are given no rights, no benefits, and while they do receive a wage, it is only $1.00 USD per day! They aren’t allowed to unionize or bargain for better working conditions. Tea workers are one of South Asia’s most deprived communities in terms of fair wages, access to education, healthcare, nutrition, and other basic human needs.

Click through images from Bangladesh’s tea gardens, below:

Faith amidst the Floods

Flooded and underwater

Millions of men, women, and children are suffering from the ongoing torrential monsoon rains that have occurred in Bangladesh this year. These rains have caused 90% of the region to become flooded and underwater. Families including Nurjahan’s are experiencing heartbreaking circumstances completely out of their control as they lack food, potable water, and shelter. YOU can send life-saving aid to 400 families in the Diocese of Sylhet as they lack the necessities to survive. Your kindness and generosity have helped them in the past, and they need our relief now more than ever.
Faith Amidst the Floods: Help Bangladesh Now!
Faith Amidst the Floods: Help Bangladesh Now!
Faith Amidst the Floods: Help Bangladesh Now!
Faith Amidst the Floods: Help Bangladesh Now!

We can make a difference in the lives of many in the Jaflong, Khadim, Mugaipar, and Rajai areas, including Nurjahan’s family. When the floods came, her family, including her gravely ill husband, lost everything and became homeless. She painfully depicts seeing a wall of water rush through their bamboo home in northeastern Bangladesh as the flood disintegrated it. Not only did they lose their home, but they also lost nearby roads and crops essential for transportation and survival. Nurjahan and her family solely survived by selling and bartering chickens and ducks as the floodwaters began to subside in the following weeks, but that source of income has run dry. The Diocese has given aid to her family, but their resources are not enough to care for the hundreds of displaced families who have been affected by the flooding.

Faith Amidst the Floods: Help Bangladesh Now!

As we have fostered hope and change in the Diocese of Sylhet, we can continue to support them during this difficult time as they face life-threatening conditions due to the floods. We hope to provide urgent relief for400 families who are in dire need of food, water, and medicines in the Jaflong, Khadim, Mugaipar, and Rajai areas. Join us as we stand with these families by giving them life-saving essentials and displaying true servants’ hearts in their time of need.

Bottomley Home Girls’ Orphanage

Located in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Bottomley Home provides a safe place for 130 girls to grow up. According to Orphan Trust, these girls would “otherwise be living in the streets, battling for survival.”

Instead, they grow up in the safety and protection offered by the Associates of Mary, Queen of Apostles (SMRA), a women’s religious order that operates the orphanage and runs the associated school.

Bottomley was orginally a school, but at the end of World War II, it also became an orphanage to serve the many children whose parents were killed.

The sisters continue the important mission of raising, forming, and educating young women to this day. Many of the girls go on to hold careers as teachers or nurses.

Bangladesh - Deacon Rick Medina, CWM Executive Director, pictured with Sister Hima, SMRA, and residents of Bottomley Home Girls' Orphanage

Deacon Rick Visits Bangladesh

Bangladesh - Deacon Rick Medina, CWM Executive Director, and Danny Sequeira, CWM partner, present Cardinal D'Rozario of Bangladesh with a new chalice and paten.

Pope Francis visited Myanmar and Bangladesh in 2017. His visit was in response to the persecution of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, which killed thousands of people and caused thousands more to flee to neighboring Bangladesh. During his visit, Pope Francis preached equality and human dignity, and forgiveness. While the Rohingya have technically begun to return to Myanmar in the months since the pope’s visit, most of them remain in Bangladesh. We continue to pray for a peaceful resolution in both countries.

Our own executive director, Deacon Rick Medina, got to travel to Bangladesh during Pope Francis’ visit. He was joined by Danny Sequeira, Catholic World Mission partner. It was a blessed and fruitful trip, and opened the door for Catholic World Mission to help support the Church in Bangladesh.

Read a full article about Deacon Rick’s trip in the Georgia Bulletin, originally published on December 21, 2017.

Visit the “Photos” tab to see more pictures from Deacon Rick’s trip to Bangladesh!

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