But it's NOT true. Many Haitian churches and individuals give - sacrificially - to minister to their neighbors. The man who started The Potter's House orphanage GAINS nothing material from the enterprise - he simply couldn't bare seeing the children wander alone and helpless. Our friend Pastor Civil dreams of starting a school at his church on the hillside - certainly not as a source of income, but rather to reach out to families who can't afford to send children to existing schools.
And then there's Daniel.
A few weeks ago, this young man caught me as I left my afternoon English class, introduced himself and asked if I would be willing to help him practice his English skills. I get requests like this all the time and I usually explain that I have a wife and four kids and a full-time job and so I can't make any promises or big commitments, but I would be willing to do what I can. We exchanged phone numbers.
This past Friday night he called me and asked if I would be interested in coming to his house Saturday morning to see how he ministers to the children in his neighborhood. A mutual friend, Jane, has connections to food programs and sometimes gives him bulk food with which he feeds several dozen children who live nearby - on a regular basis.
The idea certainly appealed to me, so yesterday morning Daniel came by our house and I joined him on a tap-tap towards Cap Haitien. We jumped off at the National gas station and headed towards the river. It's my experience that the closer to the river one lives, the greater the poverty.
Daniel is a university student, studying law - with fewer resources even than the typical American college student. But he's a follower of Christ, which is why he couldn't just ignore the hungry kids in his neighborhood. We left the main street, traveled a short distance down an alley and then squeezed down a narrow passage way to a SMALL courtyard outside the two rooms Daniel calls home. There we found his good friend dishing up vegetable soup for dozens of boys and girls. Most had already been served and the serving bowl was almost empty.
Daniel was quite proud of his friend for his willingness to help out while Daniel had left to fetch me.
I asked Daniel to show me what was on the menu for the morning.
Many boys were still standing around the courtyard while they finished their soup off.
While many of the smaller kids sat on the floor of Daniel's bedroom out of the sun.
When I say "courtyard", it probably brings the wrong images to your mind. It was just a slab of concrete surrounded on all sides by cement walls, with just the narrow passageway back towards the outside world. It was littered with the shoes of kids who had removed them in order to sit on the floor of Daniel's room.
Daniel's dad was there helping out too. Off to one side of the "courtyard" was a well, covered by a wooden plank. This water isn't clean enough to drink, but Daniel and his friends use it with a bit of bleach to wash the many dishes once everyone has been served.
After all were fed, Daniel's dad sat down to eat the burnt scrapings from the bottom of the cooking bowl.
Once the kids noticed me taking pictures, they got very playful. I'm guessing this little guy's camera had long ago ceased being operational - but he got a kick out of pretending to turn the tables on me.
I caught a pic of some of the girls coming out of one of Daniel's rooms with their empty bowls - I didn't see a bit of that soup wasted anywhere.
As always ... when God opens my eyes to further needs here, I had a lot to think about as I headed home.
Over lunch today I told the kids about my experience and how Daniel would love to somehow host a Christmas party for these kids later this month. Caleb, Hannah, Samuel and Sarah agreed that maybe getting involved in making it happen would be a great way for our family to celebrate Christmas this year.
I will keep you posted.
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