Find or Post a Team

Click below to Find a team to join or Post a team you are planning in relation to Gulf Coast/Inland Mississippi Recovery. Listings are updated periodically, so check back from time to time. http://tnumc.org/index.cfm?PAGE_ID=1849.

Also, when you see a little blue "lighthouse" next to a title, you can click the title to go to our Disater Response webpage.

PLEASE contact the call centers of affected annual conferences to schedule teams (NOT local churches). Pastors have been overwhelmed by direct phone calls and need people to “use the connection.” Some areas can host volunteers, while others still need totally self-sufficient teams. The call centers can help provide information and make connections, allowing the local church to focus on ministry. Teams are greatly in need in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Florida (west and south). The call center numbers:

Alabama-West Florida Conference Storm Center - (866) 340-1956
Louisiana United Methodist Storm Center - (877) 345.5193
Mississippi Conference Storm Center - 866/435-7091 or 7092 or 7093
Florida Conference Storm Recovery Center - (800) 282-8011 ext 149
Texas Conference 713-533-3713 (temporary), new call center number TBA

Street Children in Tallinn, Estonia: Lighthouse Care Center

Story and photos by Mall Tamm

Lighthouse Care Center children work together on a puzzle.


Martin [not his real name] came to our Lighthouse Care Center when he got very hungry. His mother had left him when he was just a couple of years old. The boy lived with a mostly-absent father. His father’s girlfriend was an alcoholic. When the father ended up in prison, the woman turned to prostitution, and Martin found himself on the streets of Tallinn, where he stole, drank, and smoked. He didn’t go to school and slept wherever he happened to be. When he couldn’t find food, he came to the Lighthouse Care Center. With us he found more than food, clothing, and a shower—he found compassion and care. In our center, he began to develop physically and mentally. We discovered he was quite musical and quick to learn languages. Today he has been baptized, has given up many bad habits, and envisions a future for himself that he couldn’t imagine before.

Maria [not her real name] came to us after she was raped by her mother’s boyfriend. Her mother was aware of this but blamed her daughter for what happened, so Maria felt entirely alone with her shame and distress. She became psychologically unstable, no longer attended school, and lost her trust in all adults. Eventually, she learned to trust one staff member at our center and confided in her. Together with the social workers, we worked out a program for her that included treatment in a psycho-neurological hospital. Today, Maria is a stable and joyful teenager who is actively involved in one of our programs, has made a good friend here, and manages at school quite well.

The Route to the Streets
Martin and Maria are just two of the children with whom we work at the Lighthouse in Tallinn, Estonia. These children and teenagers are from broken homes: often they don’t have a father, and sometimes they don’t have a mother either. Some who lived with an alcoholic and/or violent stepfather experienced abuse. Parents whose children end up living on the streets are unable to care for their offspring for a variety of reasons. Some are poor, antisocial, unable to cope with social pressures, unemployed, overworked, or simply careless. Sometimes children do not have enough food at home or decent clothing.

In some cases, children on the streets are brought to us by social workers from the city’s social department. In other cases, the children themselves invite other children, which happens with families that live in the city illegally; the city’s social department does not have any records of these families.



Children try their hand at drama in the Lighthouse Care Center


Lighthouse Ministries
We work together with the municipal government, organizations for child protection, police, hospitals, and churches. Our aim is to find ways to help families, but too often the families don’t want anyone to intervene. Undocumented immigrants are afraid that they will be deported. Our center tries to create a network that gives support to the child, helps with education, and especially exposes the child to different alternatives in the world, where there is care, love, and joy. We offer them various activity groups where they can learn skills and develop trust. We also tell them about the Bible and Christian principles.

Lighthouse Care Center was created in 2001 as a United Methodist initiative in Estonia. Today it is sponsored by various United Methodist churches in the United States, the local municipal government, and other sources. The staff includes seven persons, but a number of volunteers contribute their time, expertise, and energy for the children. The center’s list of children is 60 names long, but on a normal day, we work with about 20 to 25 children. For more photos and information, visit our website (and click the English button): http://www.lastekeskus.ee.

*Mall Tamm is the director of the Lighthouse Care Center in Tallinn, Estonia, a ministry of The United Methodist Church in Estonia.

This article was first published in New World Outlook, November-December 2005, by the General Board of Global Ministries. Used by Permission. To receive New World Outlook, as a bimonthly subscription, visit our website: http://gbgm-umc.org/nwo or call tollfree: 1-877-881-2385.


Street Children in Eastern Europe
A number of United Methodist leaders in Eastern Europe weighed in with their opinions on the definitions, causes, and church responsibilities regarding street children.

Bratislava, Slovak Republic
An abandoned child is considered to be an orphan in the Slovak Republic. It well may be that his/her parents are still living.

Street children are not a real problem in Slovakia. Abandoned children
are public welfare cases and are placed into so-called "children’s homes" run by the state. There are approximately 5000 children in the children homes of Slovakia.

The UMC in Slovakia helps orphans in several children’s homes through Christian programs of word and deed. Our congregations and individuals prepare programs for children’s homes on special occasions (Christmas, Easter, VIM-team visits). The most systematic work is held in Sered, directed by Mrs. Milena Belkova. This work has been supported by United Methodist churches in the United States over several years. Programs often involve the distribution of various gifts to children (such as Bibles, books, clothing, and school supplies).

Submitted by Superintendent Pavel Prochazka for the UMC in the Slovak Republic.

Novi Sad, Serbia/Montenegro
An orphan is a child who has lost both parents or just his or her mother. We have children who are beggars on the street during the day, but they have parents and a place to sleep at night. We have some teenagers who run away from home and sometimes they live on the street.

State and government institutions or social centers are responsible for homeless children here. Sometimes the children live in orphanages, but they can be placed with families who are willing to adopt children and care for them until their 18th birthday.

State institutions are good at resolving the problem of homeless and orphaned children and we as the church can do only so much to improve the whole issue. We can only offer humanitarian aid to the social centers and orphanages from time to time, which is what we have done for the past 10 years.

Before World War II, The United Methodist Church in (then) Yugoslavia opened an orphanage, but it was nationalized and the children at the time were placed in state orphanages.

Submitted by the Rev. Jarmila Kalko for the UMC in Novi Sad/Serbia-Montenegro.

Budapest, Hungary
Orphans in Hungary live in state-run orphanages. However, this kind of preparation for life is poor, and children who leave the orphanage upon their 18th birthday often end up on the streets. They get some financial support from the state, but they were never taught how to deal with money, and they may lack fundamental (moral) values.

Street children are not necessarily orphans! But because of structural changes in Hungarian society and a growing number of unemployed people, there are more and more children and teenagers living on the streets (12 percent, according to a recent statistic).

The United Methodist Church in Hungary has no ministry of its own with or for street children. Some individual congregations (Szolnok, Szekszard, Dombovar) work with children in state orphanages and children’s homes. In Budapest, the capital of Hungary, a Christian Working Group for Street Children was founded in January 2005. This group consists of committed people from different churches, two of which are United Methodists. The group works with teenagers who live more on the streets than at home.

Submitted by Ms. Christiane Hecker for the UMC in Budapest, Hungary.

The above statements were gathered by Urs Schweizer, assistant to Bishop Heinrich Bolleter, and Ullas Tankler, GBGM Executive Secretary in Mission Contexts and Relationships, Europe Desk.

UMCOR selects Katrina aid partners

Dec. 16, 2005
NEW YORK (UMNS) -Ten social service and voluntary organizations have been announced by the United Methodist Committee on Relief as participants in its $66 million Katrina Aid Today initiative.

The initiative is sponsored by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Selected by a grants review board, the organizations will oversee 3,000 professional staff and volunteers who will assist 100,000 families displaced by Hurricane Katrina in rebuilding their lives.
Trained by UMCOR, the staff and volunteers will help survivors identify sources of support, develop personal recovery plans, acquire access to services and take appropriate actions to bring them to self-sufficiency.

UMCOR currently is in final contract negotiations with the 10 organizations, which are Boat People SOS, Falls Church, Va.; Catholic Charities USA, Alexandria, Va.; Episcopal Relief and Development, New York; Lutheran Disaster Response, Chicago; the National Disability Rights Network, Washington; the Odyssey House of Louisiana, New Orleans; the Salvation Army, Atlanta; the Society of St. Vincent De Paul, St. Louis; United Methodist Foundation of Louisiana, Baton Rouge; and Volunteers of America, Alexandria, Va.

These organizations "have a track record of responding to the needs of disaster survivors in a recovery effort," said the Rev. Paul Dirdak, UMCOR's chief executive. Each partner also has pledged matching funds or in-kind donations for the work, he added.

Partners in the Katrina Aid Today consortium focus their work on the disaster zones of Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, as well as areas serving families that have been relocated to Texas, Georgia, California, Florida, Illinois, Tennessee, Arkansas, Kentucky, Missouri, New Jersey, Colorado, Connecticut, Washington D.C., Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, New York, Oklahoma and Washington. Some of the partners have expertise working with people with disabilities and non-English-speaking families.

The grants review board making the selection consisted of representatives from the American Red Cross, Mississippi Commission for Volunteer Service, Christian Reformed World Relief Committee, Church World Service and the Points of Light Foundation.

More information about Katrina Aid Today or its partner grantees can be found at www.katrinaaidtoday.org, the program's Web site.

*The United Methodist Committee on Relief provided information for this report.

Hurricanes 2005: Where the Money Goes

New York, NY, December 6, 2005—The United Methodist Committee on Relief. (UMCOR) is assisting recovery in 13 states either directly affected by 2005 hurricanes or hosting hurricane evacuees. Some $24 million has so far been contributed by Church members and friends. Still more effort and more funds will be required to respond to this year’s horrific storms, especially Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

UMCOR’s “specialty” is long term relief and recovery work. In the case of Hurricane Katrina, UMCOR estimates that long term will translate to upwards of six years, particularly in hard-hit areas of Louisiana and Mississippi.

The $24 million mark in contribution was reached at the end of November, according to Roland Fernandes, treasurer of the General Board of Global Ministries, of which UMCOR is a part.

Establishing a Long Term System of Response
In order for the long term recovery process to work, there needs to be a good establishment of the system. UMCOR works through annual conferences in each affected area which must have a contractor, a volunteer coordinator, local recovery stations, and a process to evaluate requests for assistance and to handle them in a fair and equitable way. They need to purchase supplies and set up material depots and coordinate the release of supplies. While UMCOR is providing training, consultant support, and funding to help each annual conference provide all of these services, it still takes time to set up an effective system to respond over the long term.

The magnitude of the damage wrought by Hurricane Katrina means that what would seem what would be significant strides for recovery in other hurricanes appears to be only drops in the bucket in response to this one.

Where the Money Goes
The UMCOR board of directors voted to disperse funds to affected annual conferences for hurricane relief and recovery according to their expressed immediate needs at their fall board meeting. The funds released to Mississippi and Louisiana are for use in only the initial six months following the hurricane because the size of this disaster prevents us from foreseeing all of the possibilities for need. More funds will be sent to these annual conferences as these additional needs are made known.

Alabama-West Florida (12 months)
$914,000
Mississippi (6 months)
$1,397,289
Louisiana (6 months)
$2,052,221

This is in addition to $10,000 emergency grants that UMCOR sent to each of the following 18 United Methodist National Mission Institutions for immediate relief work.

Alabama
Dumas Wesley House
Faith Mission Outreach
Arkansas
Camp Aldersgate
Georgia
Open Door Community House
Illinois
Lessie Bates David Neighborhood House
Kentucky
The Bennett Center of London
Louisiana
Dulac Community House
Methodist Home for Children
Louisiana United Methodist Church Children and Family Services
Huston-Tillotson University
Mississippi
Wood Institute
Wesley House
Bethlehem Center
Moore Community House
Texas
Wesley House, Houston
Wesley Community Center
Good Neighbor Settlement House
Grace Community Services

UMCOR also sent $10,000 emergency grants to each of the following 11 annual conferences serving evacuees.

Alabama-West Florida
Florida
Kentucky
Mississippi, North Texas
Missouri
North Alabama
Oklahoma
Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference
Texas
Virginia
Wisconsin

Additional Areas of Support

Cleanup
UMCOR purchased and dispersed $85,543 in cleanup supplies such as mops, brooms, and buckets.

Consultants
UMCOR has placed 16 domestic disaster consultants, some full time in the field, to provide guidance to annual conferences in setting up their call service centers and long term recovery programs. The cost of their deployment as of Nov. 16 is $126,547.

Partner Agencies
UMCOR sent $50,000 to support Church World Service’s evacuee resettlement program.

International
This year’s storms also caused great tragedies in Central America. Thus far UMCOR has sent $69,095 to local partner organizations in Guatemala, Mexico, and El Salvador.

This list of numbers and places UMCOR has provided funding for does not include the incalculable cost of time so many volunteers have already provided and the generous spirit of churches who have opened their doors, their treasures, and their hearts to the hurting.

How You Can Help
If you would like to print and share this information with others, click here to download UMCOR’s latest Report to Donors.
Give to UMCOR Advance #982523, Hurricanes 2005
Online at: www.methodistrelief.org By phone: 1-800-554-8583By check: at your local church, or by mail to: UMCOR PO Box 9068 New York, NY 10087-9068

Regional refugee programs help hurricane evacuees

Dec. 2, 2005
By Carol Fouke*
NEW YORK (UMNS) - Partnerships between local congregations and refugee resettlement agencies are key to the support Church World Service is providing in 10 states to people displaced by the Gulf hurricanes.

CWS, the humanitarian agency, is working with its Miami Office and eight of its local resettlement affiliates in communities across the United States to provide comprehensive, individualized services to Gulf Coast residents who have relocated.

National church bodies that support the CWS Immigration and Refugee Program stepped forward with special funding for the hurricane evacuees, and additional money is being raised as part of public appeals for funds to support a broad CWS program of assistance to hurricane survivors.

Participating denominations include the United Methodist Church, as well as the American Baptist Churches in the USA, Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Christian Reformed Church, Presbyterian Church (USA), Reformed Church in America and United Church of Christ.
Resettlement agencies train participating congregations on ways they can provide moral and material support in order to assist these uprooted people as they recover their dignity and regain self-sufficiency in their new communities, whether their stay is short or long. Giving priority to people most in need, the Church World Service program is helping hurricane evacuees sort out the myriad disaster relief programs; find jobs, health care, and affordable housing and furnishings; get their children enrolled in school; and get oriented to and integrated into their new communities.

"This privately funded program takes the professional case management and congregational co-sponsorship model that CWS uses to help refugees - people fleeing persecution in their home countries for safety in the United States - and applying it to help meet the particular needs of Americans displaced by the Gulf hurricanes," explained Erol Kekic, associate director of the CWS Immigration and Refugee Program.

'God has a plan'

In Chicago, for example, the Interfaith Refugee & Immigration Ministries is providing assistance to hurricane evacuees. Kelley Johnson of the agency's evacuee assistance program said she assesses clients' needs, matches them with congregational sponsors, and gives "follow-up support for current sponsors who are working with cases needing more high-volume case management attention."

Gulf Coast evacuees who are getting back on their feet with that agency's help include a refugee from Eritrea who had resettled in New Orleans in March under the auspices of Catholic Charities. He was working in New Orleans, but when Katrina struck, he was evacuated to Baton Rouge, Johnson said.

"Following the hurricane, he came to Chicago to live with an Eritrean refugee friend, who offered his hospitality," she said. "They seem quite content to be together and to have each other." Trinity United Methodist Church in Wilmette, Ill., is helping both men with winter clothing, rent and transportation.

Johnson also told of three friends - a physician, diabetes educator and bilingual teacher - from New Orleans who lost everything to Hurricane Katrina and relocated to Chicago. All need to get re-licensed to work in their respective fields in Illinois.

Johnson's agency found them housing in the parsonage of First United Methodist Church of Elmhurst, and she said the congregation has become a support system for them.

The physician, Dr. Tony Capps, told Johnson that congregation members "have been right there when we needed anything. I am so appreciative of all the good things that people are trying to do.

"It is hard sometimes to be on the receiving end when I am always the caregiver," Capps said. "But it is times like these that teach us humility and thankfulness. I am learning to grow in new directions due to this tragic change in my life. God has a plan, and I am doing my best to quiet my heart and listen."

Partnering with churches

By late October, the CWS/IRP Miami Office was assisting 84 clients from the U.S. Gulf Coast. Jose Sanchez, who is coordinating the office's evacuee assistance program, described the services CWS has offered: "We assessed each person's needs, provided a basic community orientation, and referred them to such mainstream services as Medicaid and food stamps, making sure basic needs for food and clothing were met.

"We also refer evacuees to the Principe de Paz Evangelical Lutheran Church in Miami, Fla., which is offering $100 in food assistance to each evacuee family weekly. Most take advantage of this support. We've also been working with South Florida Work Force to provide employment services."

PARA Refugee Services in Grand Rapids, Mich., had assessed 21 evacuees' needs by the end of October, and already had matched many with congregational sponsors.

Cornerstone United Methodist Church in Grand Rapids stepped forward to help a Louisiana man find his own place after living in a temporary shelter for more than a month. Sunshine Christian Reformed Church in Grand Rapids is assisting a New Orleans woman who got stranded in Grand Rapids when Hurricane Katrina hit.

First United Methodist Church and three Christian Reformed congregations - Cascade Fellowship, Westview and South Grandville - also are sponsoring families who relocated to Grand Rapids from the U.S. Gulf Coast.

By early November, Refugee Resettlement and Immigration Services of Atlanta had evaluated the needs of nearly 500 Gulf Coast evacuees and trained 60 churches in how to assist them. To date, 50 churches, along with other groups, have agreed to sponsor an identified evacuee family or families.

In September, Oak Grove United Methodist Church in Atlanta welcomed both a refugee family from Russia and an evacuee family - Tamika Obleton, Raymon Nealy Jr. and their two sons - from New Orleans. The church found and furnished apartments for both families, and within two weeks got Raymon Nealy Jr. a job interview. First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Atlanta is assisting Tamika's sister, her fiancé and their 4-year-old son.

Refugee Services of Texas is providing assistance to evacuees through its offices in Dallas, Fort Worth and Austin. "The numbers here are overwhelming," said Chip Corcoran, who is overseeing the program.

In Austin, about 75 evacuee families have been matched with 30 area churches, and an additional 80 families will be matched soon, according to the agency's Ashley Gillespie.
"Since most evacuees' housing needs have been taken care of, the majority of churches are involved in what we call a 'neighborhood project,'" she said. "The sponsors help evacuees navigate Austin social services, assist them with transportation, and help them integrate within their new communities. They phone the evacuees a couple times a week and bring them a few meals every once in a while."

Hearts wide open

The Virginia Council of Churches Refugee Resettlement Program in Richmond is assisting evacuees through its Richmond, Hampton Roads/Newport News, and Harrisonburg offices.
VCC-Hampton Roads is working to link local churches with hurricane evacuees to assist with housing, employment, transportation and furnishings. The VCC's Teri Doddy reported many ongoing needs - and congregations' tireless help.

"Their hearts are wide open," she said. "I think we all realize it could be any one of us. When you are sitting in front of someone who has been affected, you can't walk away. I've cried with people, hugged them, taken them to the doctor. Several people who spent days in their flooded homes before being rescued still are ill from the mold and mildew."

Among Virginia congregations lending a hand is Courthouse Community United Methodist Church in Virginia Beach, which started by assembling and shipping 100 CWS "Gift of the Heart" health kits and numerous emergency clean-up buckets for Gulf hurricane survivors, then contributed almost $12,000 through the United Methodist Committee on Relief for its post-hurricane response.

In addition, the congregation signed up to provide an evacuee family of five with "hospitality" for up to six months. The church is offering housing and employment assistance, food and furnishings.

Lynnhaven United Methodist Church in Virginia Beach is sponsoring a woman, her parents and her two children, providing housing and employment assistance, furnishings, clothing and food. Ebenezer United Methodist Church in Suffolk is "sponsoring a couple completely, providing housing for up to six months, furnishings, food, clothing, and trying to find them a vehicle."

*Fouke is a staff member of the CWS Immigration and Refugee Program.

Earthquake survivors still living on the edge

Nov. 30, 2005
By United Methodist News Service*

Winter weather has left hundreds of thousands of South Asian earthquake survivors still without proper shelter, according to relief organizations.

As a consequence, the first cold-related deaths were reported Nov. 29 by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. Two children died of pneumonia and a man died of hypothermia, according to the United Nations.

The Oct. 8 earthquake killed an estimated 80,000 people and left up to 3 million homeless. Snow has started to block delivery of relief supplies by helicopter or road to the affected villages in the Himalayas.

The United Methodist Committee on Relief is working with Church World Service to assist earthquake survivors, particularly in northern Pakistan and Kashmir.

Another emerging problem, according to Marvin Parvez, CWS Pakistan-Afghanistan regional director, is that many of the emergency tents already distributed are not winterized, prompting some to light fires inside the tents. In Maiddan, a village north of Islamabad destroyed by the earthquake, two children have died because of a tent fire, he reported.

"Many of these survivors have never lived in tents, have no knowledge of the fire hazards facing them, and they're not being given basic fire prevention instructions or any kind of fire-extinguishing equipment," Parvez said Oct. 28. "It only takes one candle."

CWS is urging all nongovernmental agencies responding in Pakistan "to work together to at least give the survivors basic safety instructions." With offices throughout Pakistan, CWS is coordinator of the Pakistan Humanitarian Forum.

In Washington, Donna Derr, director of the CWS Emergency Response Program, said basic fire-extinguishing equipment should be part of tent or shelter supplies. CWS is pursuing additional resources for alternative shelter options and additional heating equipment and for solutions to the fire hazard concerns.

On Nov. 5, CWS - working with Finnchurchaid, Norwegian Church Aid and Great Britain's Christian Aid - distributed a donation from Finland's Ministry of the Interior that provided blankets, sweaters and enough winterized tents and heaters to shelter 15,000 people.

Donations to the United Methodist relief effort can be marked for "UMCOR Advance #232000, Pakistan Earthquake," and placed in church offering plates or sent to UMCOR, P.O. Box 9068, New York, N.Y. 10087-9068. Contributions also can be made by phone at (800) 554-8583 or online at www.methodistrelief.org. If funds are intended for recovery in a specific region, that should be noted. More information is available at http://gbgm-umc.org/umcor/emergency/earthquake/index.stm.

*Church World Service contributed information to this report.