In Africa it is estimated there are 200 million
orphans who struggle to survive every day. Many
don’t make it, and others have no hope for a
self-sustaining future. One organization called Zoe
Empowers is working with volunteers from the
Lighthouse United Methodist Church of Boca
Grande to change just a few of those lives … and
in the process have had their own lives changed as
well.
Gaston Warner, the chief executive offi cer
of Zoe Empowers, was in Boca
Grande earlier this year to
organize a small missionary
trip. This missionary trip
isn’t like most you’ve
heard of, though,
because there are
no donations to ask
for, no items for
the parishioners to
take to their destination
countries of
Rwanda and Kenya.
They took their
listening ears, their
watching eyes and their
loving hearts instead.
What they heard and saw
astounded them, and forever
changed their outlook on relief missions
for those living in ultra-poverty.
Zoe Empowers is a three-year study program for
orphans that was designed to equip them with the
knowledge and tools to take care of themselves.
They are taught about everything from human
traffi cking situations and how to deal with them
to animal husbandry, farming and the essentials of
providing themselves with clean drinking water. Set
up in groups of 100 orphans, each empowerment
group includes numerous child-headed households
that might include a single child or a group of eight
siblings. The eldest in the groups are about 12 to 20
years old, the youngest can be infants. As soon as the
oldest children start the program and begin to provide
68 GASPARILLA MAGAZINE November/December 2019
food for their family, and living situations stabilize,
the group members begin to adopt others.
“The empowerment is just a pebble in
the pond, the ripples go out with
the children replicating the
program on their own,”
Gaston said.
They have found
that most of the
groups stay
together, even
after graduation.
By that time they
have a revolving
source of capital,
they have social,
spiritual and fi -
nancial relationships
… sometimes seven,
eight, even nine years
past their graduation.
“They won’t let each other
fail,” Gaston said. “If someone has
mental disabilities, or if they are struggling but
still trying, someone will bring them on as a business
partner. If they’re lazy and not trying, they are kicked
out of the group. They have all been on the edge of
life, and they don’t want to see anyone else suffer as
they have.”
By Marcy Shortuse
Photos provided