Reps Circular
Wishing you peace and blessings in 2011
2011 promises us a fresh start, and along these lines, here are my wishes for the New Year:
I believe that there is abundant goodness in this world – and with friends like you, I have faith that when the poorest of the poor look to HOPE Africa for help, their hearts filled with hope, knowing that their prayers will be answered.
Thank you for supporting us through 2010. May your 2011 bring you joy, good health, happiness and peace.
Yours in the service of Christ, The Most Reverend Thabo Makgoba, Archbishop of Cape Town
Dear ALMA Reps and Friends,
It may be a rather late to wish the ALMA Community a Happy 2011 but I thought you might like to share Archbishop Thabo’s New Year wishes from the HOPE Africa website which we can only echo. (Hope Africa is the Anglican Church of Southern Africa’s Social Development Programme. HOPE stands for Health Opportunity Partnership Employment.)
This Circular contains:
8 February Envelope Stuffing for Sample Lent Appeal mailing to Parishes. Please could you spare a couple of hours from 11-2, Room C, at London Diocesan House to help with the envelope stuffing to parishes. This is an essential part of the Lent Appeal work and many hands do truly make light work – we usually manage to have a good time too! Please RSVP.
10 February 5pm Lecture: African Human Rights System: a lusophone guide
Venue: B102, SOAS, Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London WC1H 0XG. THE CENTRE OF AFRICAN STUDIES, SOAS Speaker: Aua Balde – Department of Development, Centre of African Studies Fellow. The research will analyse the African human rights system in its relation to the Portuguese-speaking African countries in Africa [Lusophone Africa]. It will examine ways in which human rights defenders from Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique and Sao Tome and Principe can use the regional system to protect and promote human rights in the African continent. The guide will focus on the work of the African Commission on Human and Peoples Rights’, the African Court on Human and Peoples Rights’ and the African Committee on the Rights and the Welfare or the Child.
15 February ALMA REPS & FRIENDS MEETING with Revd Helen Van Koevering 6-8 pm Plus opportunity to collect your parishes’ 2011 Lent Appeal Materials.
There are no rooms available at Diocesan House so we are very grateful to St Peter’s Church, Notting Hill for hosting us. The full address is: 90 Kensington Park Road, London, W11 2PL and it is opposite the junction with Stanley Gardens. Nearest tube: Notting Hill Gate Central Line.
Refreshments from 5.40 pm. Please RSVP. Contributions towards refreshments welcome.
16 May ALMA REPS & FRIENDS MEETING Main Hall London Diocesan House. Meeting is 6-8 pm. Refreshments from 5.40 pm.
9 July MANNA AGM with Bishop Dinis
10 July ALMA Sunday evening Eucharist with Bishop Dinis 6 pm St Paul’s Cathedral
We would like to share with your organization you the important news:
Huila: justice at last
Christian Aid partner ACC (Association Building Communities) has reached an important victory to protect the livelihoods and the land of 2,000 agro-pastoralists families in the southwest of Angola. One year ago, the provincial government of Huila started to develop a project that would prevent the traditional pastoralists from using an area in the Gambos municipality to feed their cattle in times of drought. The communities, with support from ACC, reacted and developed an advocacy strategy to challenge the plan which consisted of petitions, meetings and audiences. After months of action, the fence that was built to prohibit their passage was removed.
10 months of more suffering
Despite the important victory in Gambos, the situation has worsened for most of the victims of the land evictions and house demolitions that took place last year in Lubango, capital of Huila. The people who were transferred for camps in Tchavola and Tchimucua continue facing inhuman living conditions. Ten months later, the families still live with no basic sanitation, with lack of food and schools and without adequate shelter and safety. So far, according to civil society organisations, four people have committed suicide because of their desperate situation. The mass evictions and demolitions happened last March, affecting 3,800 families.
Joe Hanlon’s Newsletter reports: ‘Very heavy rains in the neighbouring states of South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe have caused serious flooding and more than 100 deaths there. Since the water must pass through Mozambique, the government on Tuesday issued a “red alert”. But so far, flooding is not serious. The Pungoe, Limpopo and Zambeze rivers are slightly above alert levels, according to the report of INGC (National Disasters Management Institute) Wednesday. This is enough to flood fields close to the rivers.
AIM reported Thursday that 12,000 people have been forced to move from low-lying areas near the Limpopo; some people have fled from close to other rivers. Five schools near the Limpopo and three near the Pungue are closed. There are reports of 10 flood-related deaths in Mozambique’.
More information Title - Southern Africa Floods Situation Update# 2
Source - UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
Date 26 Jan 2011
| Month | Trainings | Episcopal visits |
|---|---|---|
| January
rains |
5-21 Orientation & Retreat for six ordinands | Lichinga archdeaconry
22: Ordination of six deacons, Messumba |
| February
rains |
10-16 Helen: visit to UK | 6-12 Synod of Bishops, SA |
| March
rains |
14-31 Discipling course for 40+ adeptos (for VIDA), catechists etc, Lichinga.
21-23 MU Executive & Diocesan leadership meetings |
4-7 Mandimba.
25-27 Nansenhenje. |
Please continue to pray for Pemba. Father Fenias’ unexpected death has greatly affected the parish. Now the Parish Catechist, Luis, has been called up for his military service in Nacala.. Bishop Mark has, in the interim, sent Padre Mateus Ntiko from Nacala to work in Pemba with the support of a missionary couple Ronald and Evelyn Koch who live in Pemba. (They previously lived in Cuamba and helped establish Mechanhelas with Padre Luciano). Please pray for them all and for Luis’ wife Joyce who is, with their baby son Juliao, currently in Lichinga with the MU there and possibly going to join the woman’s catechist course in April.
It is almost all systems go for Lent Appeal 2011: TRAINING GOD’S PEOPLE
The card and posters A4 and, for the first time a limited number of A3 posters, are currently being printed. The sample mail shot to parishes will be posted on 8 February and I’m hoping some of you will come in between 11-2 to Room C on the 8th to help us get this prepared. Usually we have a lot of fun too.
We will be distributing resources at the Reps meeting on 15 February BUT we have to transport these to Notting Hill so it would be really helpful if we had your order on the Materials Request Form (
49Kb) by 8 February so we can do this efficiently!
As usual additional materials will be on the website. We have to date:
Dear Donald and Jane,
Deus e bom. Todo Tempo
Part of God’s goodness to us has been the gift of your ministry. This, through the Willesden links you formed with Mozambique in the 1980s, paved the way for ALMA and ALMA has quite simply changed the way we are church - by abolishing distance and enabling us, in a more real way, to be the body of Christ together.
We thank you both for steadfastly ensuring our faith is outward looking, practical, prophetic and passionate. ALMA has blessed all four partner dioceses. Love comes to you from Angola, Lebombo, London and Niassa, from the Church and Mothers' Union, to wish you well in your new home in Romsey. You will be hugely missed and will always be deeply loved.
Todo Tempo, Deus e bom.
He’s got Mozambique and London in his hands
He’s got Northolt and Chigoma in his hands
He’s got Greenford and Angola in his hands
He’s got the whole world in his hands
I look forward to seeing some of you on 8 February, and hopefully many of you on 15 February. Offers of refreshments to Helen Doery on: almacomms@london.anglican.org
Sheenagh
Sheenagh Burrell