Monthly Archives: February 2012

One small cry: Hassane’s fight against malnutrition

Posted on February 15, 2012 by Lauren Fisher in Disaster Relief

Lauren Fisher, emergency communications manager with World Vision, has been deployed to Niger for five weeks. Throughout West Africa, as many as 23 million people may be affected by the hunger crisis there in the coming months, including 13 million in World Vision’s program areas. Follow Lauren here on our blog or @WorldVisionNews (#wvlauren) for live, on-the-ground reports from the field. * * * It was the best moment of the day. Not the warm smiles and waves of the villagers, not the sound and sight of sparkling, precious water hitting the waiting buckets, not even the laughs of children seeing how my camera worked. Instead, the moment that brought us all to laughs, clapping, and even near tears came...

Change that happens when women come together

Posted on February 15, 2012 by Guest blogger in Causes

Dr. Leslie Parrott, author and family therapist, will speak at the 2012 Women of Vision national conference, March 4-6 in Washington, D.C. Here, she shares some of her personal experiences and why she believes in the collective power of women to create positive, lasting change in the world....

“Be a person who is love”

Posted on February 14, 2012 by Rachael Dill Boyer in Christian Witness, Stories

Have you ever met someone who just radiates the love, light, and peace of God? Last month, while traveling in Swaziland, I had the privilege of meeting Nomsa, a World Vision volunteer AIDS caregiver. She is one of those people — so full of the love of God that it can’t help but spill out to those around her. This Valentine’s Day, I wanted to share her story. Nomsa presented me with a new way of looking at 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 (NIV): “Love is patient, love is kind…it always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” In a society that often equates the word “love” with romantic love, I had forgotten that this verse is talking about the way we...

Making Valentine’s Day more than romance

Posted on February 13, 2012 by Laura Reinhardt in Stories

Valentine’s Day is all about love and the heart. Normally, it’s focused on romantic love, but I’d like to extend that love to include compassion for our neighbors — people in need in the United States. While the recent economic news looks slightly more positive, there are still more than 12 million Americans without work or steady income. They’re forced to make tough choices, such as whether to pay the rent or feed their children. They’re running hard on a treadmill, but never making progress toward lasting improvement. One of those Americans is a woman I recently met from New York City named Veronica Melendez....

Four things any church can do to address global poverty

Posted on February 13, 2012 by Rich Stearns in Advocacy, Christian Witness

Churches and pastors are often eager to respond to the problems of global poverty and injustice. Yet before they take steps to address these problems, pastors — like anyone else — want to know how they can make a difference. Because there are so many hurting people whose communities face complex obstacles, I’m frequently asked what one person or one church can do. If you’re a fellow church or ministry leader, you know that God doesn’t promise that the odds will always be in our favor when accomplishing the work He has set before us. When church leaders look today at the scale of global poverty, it’s easy to feel like the numbers are stacked against them. 1 billion people...