by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Fr. Lance P. Nadeau, M.M. and Fr. John W. Waldrep, M.M.
There is tremendous food insecurity in Kenya with more than two million Kenyans considered to be experiencing either a food crisis or a food emergency. This dire state of affairs is prevalent in both rural and urban settings and continues to be exacerbated by certain factors including below-average crop harvests, weaker crop sales for families, lower wages for casual labor and food inflation of about 7%.
Over the last year, Father Waldrep has been able to help people affected by food insecurity in five different counties in Kenya and hopes to do so again this year. In three of these counties, the people that Father Waldrep helped are food stressed and eating minimally adequate diets but must make significant changes to their lifestyles to support non-food needs. In two of the counties helped by Father Waldrep, some people are in a food crisis and acute malnutrition affects 10-15% of the population.
While some families are simply not eating enough food, others are adopting non-sustainable coping mechanisms such as selling assets to eat. In the county where many people are classified as being in a food emergency, the risk of hunger-related death is rapidly increasing.
Father Waldrep wants to continue to help as many of these Kenyans as possible receive adequate food and nutrition and your gift can help to make this happen.
“For he satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.”
Psalm 107:9
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Well at St. Charles Lwanga Secondary School
Fr. Lance P. Nadeau, M.M. and Fr. John W. Waldrep, M.M.
Clean water is a precious commodity in Kenya.
By digging and constructing a well on the land of St. Charles Lwanga Secondary School, owned by the church, some pressure will be taken off about 3,000 residents of the rural areas in Kabaroti Parish and St. Charles Lwanga Secondary School.
Your gift will help us with this mission by improving the access to clean water and sanitation for many of these people.
“Like cold water to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country.”
Isaiah 33:15-16
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Scholarships for Students
Fr. Michael J. Briggs, M.M.
Maryknoll has a tradition of supporting students in Peru with scholarships. Father Briggs is continuing this legacy by offering scholarships to students at the National University of the Altiplano and elsewhere.
Your gift can help these students cover some of the costs related to food, rent, transportation and fees while staying close to the Catholic Church.
“And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Philippians 2:3-4
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
St. Mary’s Third Floor Renovation
Father Kim is an Assistant Pastor at St. Mary’s Church in Hong Kong and the parish is starting major renovations on its Third Floor Meeting Rooms this year. The renovations will be green friendly given the planned use for solar panels and eco-roofing.
Your gift can help the parishioners of St. Mary’s Church in Hong Kong have beautiful new rooms for community gatherings while promoting care for the environment.
“For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?”
Luke 14:28
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Construction of Triunfo Chapel
Guatemala, Latin American
Father William L. Senger, M.M.
The community of El Triunfo de la Esperanza (The Triumph of Hope and Triunfo for short) has had an exceedingly difficult history. It involves their displacement by the Guatemalan government through the force of the army to a ranch the government bought where each family was given a small plot of land to live on and another plot to farm.
The Catholic Church along with five Protestant denominations received land gratis from the government and Maryknoll built a very simple and small chapel with a dirt floor using those funds.
Now Father Sentry wants to build a more permanent chapel to serve the small Catholic community in Triunfo and your gift can help to make this happen.
“And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”
Matthew 16:18
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Parish Maintenance and Repairs
Where there are two or more, there is the grace of God and the faithful are generally blessed to have a place to worship under this energy of love.
Parishioners of the Our Lady, Mother and Queen parish in Jaraguá, São Paulo are fortunate to have such a place, but it is currently in disrepair and particularly due to leaky roofs. This is the parish where Father Moorman is assisting the local Pastor with basic maintenance and repairs that have been neglected for many years due to less care from the previous Pastors and the limited financial resources of the parishioners in this relatively rural area.
Your gift will help with general maintenance, repair of leaky roofs of the parish church structure and the parish house along with providing for the addition of a handicapped access ramp to the building.
“Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker!”
Psalm 95:6
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Protecting Female Adolescents by Building a Dormitory
Fr. John W. Waldrep, M.M.
St. Charles Lwanga Secondary School is a charitable institution which provides education, shelter, medical care, recreation programs and basic needs to about 830 children from poor family backgrounds, orphans and from the streets in or around Ruai-Nairobi. The school’s goal is to empower these children through teaching, training, mentorship and role modeling to be self-reliant and easily integrated into the community.
Father Waldrep wants to help protect the 405 young women who attend this school from the harmful cultural practices of female genital mutilation and early marriage. This can happen through the building of a female dormitory, which will replace the current temporary structure built of corrugated metal sheets, and give day students, who have endured unsafe commutes to the school, the option of staying overnight.
Your gift will help these adolescent females buck the possibility of teenage pregnancy, dropping out of secondary school and many unpleasant consequences related to early marriage.
“And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit.”
Romans 5:5
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Education, Equality and Environmental Sustainability
This multi-purpose Apostolic Project is a comprehensive plan by the Back to Society Organization to improve the basic state of the Leanna School located in Narok, Kenya. It will provide food for vulnerable populations, pay school fees for orphans and children affected by HIV/AIDs, distribute critical healthcare needs, install a water tank to ensure access to clean water and establish a tree nursery to promote environmental conservation.
These efforts bear the message of Jesus Christ by spreading Hope and Love in very tangible ways for those who will benefit while helping the environment at the same time and your gift will be a beacon of this light.
“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
Romans 15:13
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Well at St. Anthony Vengini Outstation
Fr. Lance P. Nadeau, M.M. and Fr. John W. Waldrep, M.M.
Access to water is a daily life-and-death struggle in Kibwezi, Kenya.
The goal of this Apostolic Project is to help ease that struggle by digging and constructing a well so that Kenyans in the Kibwezi area of Makueni County in southeastern Kenya have more access to clean water. It will sit on church land in this semi-arid district, which receives approximately half the annual rainfall in Juba, South Sudan and about ten times the annual rainfall in Death Valley, CA.
Your gift can help Kenyans in Kibwezi have access to a precious but needed resource for life: water.
“But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up to eternal life.”
John 4:14
by Dionel Rodriguez | Mar 5, 2025
Well at St. Michael Kamboo Outstation
Fr. Lance P. Nadeau, M.M. and Fr. John W. Waldrep, M.M.
Imagine having to wonder whether you will have access to drinking and bathing water each day. It is hard to do given the blessings of infrastructure that we enjoy in the United States.
But in the Kibwezi area of Kenya, this is a daily question and struggle for the residents of this semi-arid district bordering Tsavo East National Park. To help ease up these challenges for some, Maryknoll is digging and constructing a well at the St. Michael Kamboo Outstation.
Your gift can help residents of this part of Kenya have greater access to something most of us take for granted: water.
“For truly I tell you, whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you bear the name of Christ will by no means lose the reward.”
Mark 9:41
