ASI: Sacrificing Food for Education

Will you please begin donating $5-10/month to AHMEN's Community Empowerment Program?

From Bottom Left to Bottom Right: Mary Guffey, Pastor Willington, Pastor Willington CA in-training, Dr. Camp, Frank Monterosa, Pastor Mario

Oftentimes when I talk to people about AHMEN's Community Empowerment Program, the AHMEN-SIFAT Initiative (ASI), they agree that the program sounds nice coming out of my mouth.  They then ask me what their donations support and what the community agents are actually taught.

Well, the first one is easy, ASI is 100% funded by individual donations.  Those donations go to pay for the logistical expenses of Dr. Byron Morales in Honduras.  They do not pay for his salary.  SIFAT does that.  They do not pay for the local quarterly workshops in Cusuna, Jutiapa, or Yorito.  The local municipalities do that.

The second one is a little more complicated and depends on the health needs of each individual community.  In Honduras, and in the workshops in general, the main health needs discussed are malaria, waterborne illness, lung disease, HIV/AIDS, and abuse.  In the words of Dr. Morales, "the goal of the program is to develop local capacity to promote total health concepts in the community."  Once each workshop's community agents master the concepts listed above, they then train their own community members to do the same.  In this way, ASI becomes an intergenerational solution to an ingrained and institutionalized cycle of poverty.

Pastor Willington and ASI need your support!

When asked if the workshops were worth continuing, Pastor Willington responded "Sometimes I go without food so I can have the travel money to attend."  I think that is a "Yes."  Pastor Willington has trekked for hours from the jungles of La Moskitia to attend ASI-Cusuna over the last four years, and he and Frank Monterosa are now strongly considering bringing an ASI quarterly workshop to train their local leadership in the communities surrounding Raista and Las Marias.

If you would like to be a part of our support system, please contact me.  We need your support!  If you would like to learn more about AHMEN's Community Empowerment Program, come to Honduras with me this June on the "Rio de Agua Viva" team.  You can work with ASI-Jutiapa and ASI-Cusuna up close an personal as part of a water filtration education program and study through Samford University.


Together, we are the difference.

Water Water Everywhere, But Not A Drop To Drink!

I sat in the shower for an extra 5 minutes this morning just trying to wake up enough to soap up my greasy hair.  I take advantage of having cheap, clean water pumped to my house.  I could drink it straight out of the faucet and never get sick.  In fact, I would get healthier.  Not only does the water I use to wash the dirt off my body not have bacteria in it, its fluoridation strengthens my teeth. 

And do I conserve every last drop for my drinking and food preparation??  Nope!  I like to think of myself as conserving more water than the next American with a Sasquatch-size carbon footprint, but I do not even begin to treat my overly clean water supply with the care and respect I should.

This message hit home with Lane Turbeville when I told her that around the world a child dies of waterborne illness every 20 seconds.  After getting horribly sick in Honduras last August from the usual bugs our Gringo stomachs can't handle, she asked me whether Hondurans get sick like she did all the time.  I told her that, if they make it through childhood, Honduran babies' stomachs grow a tolerance for the normalcy of dysentery.  Lane's response was as human as one could imagine.  "Kids shouldn't have to get used to drinking dirty water."

Six months later, Lane has developed a water purification component for AHMEN's "Rio de Agua Viva" team.  She will be conducting a research study through Samford University to both demonstrate the need for the implementation of a national infrastructure to overcome Honduran water crisis and also to prove mission teams can successfully intervene in the meantime.  

Visit Lane's YouCaring fundraising site to make her project a reality.  Contact me here to join the team and watch her make it happen!



Together, we are the difference.

Royalty Returning to Honduras as Preachers and Teachers....But Only With Your Support

Antwanae Jones of Unique by Monique and King Tall T of allGodbuddy have gotten married, y'all!  And instead of going on a honeymoon, these two have decided to go back to Honduras with AHMEN's "Rio de Agua Viva" team.

Now for those of you who know these two, this probably doesn't come as much of a surprise.  For those of you who don't, I invite you to befriend them on Facebook, Twitter, and in life.  You will see two young people with a love for Jesus like you don't come across too often.

Please support their cause in returning to Honduras to serve alongside the community agents of ASI-Cusuna, ASI-Jutiapa, and the jewelry school of Los Laureles.  Visit their "Go Fund Me" site and DONATE what you can to this amazing couple to help them return to work with the people they fell in love with last year.



Together, we are the difference.