At Star of Hope, we understand that faith is an important part of everyone's life. Faith can be placed in many things and persons but as Christians, we place our faith in Jesus Christ and make efforts to share the gospel. In fact, it is one of our four pillars, education, wellness, and social skills being the other three. As you visit our projects around the world, the Christian aspect is visible in most. We do have some projects that are purely humanitarian and we do respect donors who wish to have their contributions go to the humanitarian parts of our work. For example, the donors who contribute through the Combined Federal Campaign (CFC) should know that their funds are used only for education, feeding, and other humanitarian projects.
In the cases of disaster relief and projects that meet people's needs, we are ready to share our faith when asked but don't restrict our help based upon religion. As we meet the needs of those hurting we are often asked, why do you help us? We are ready to share that Jesus commands us to help and explain the good news of Jesus Christ but we provide this type of assistance without any restriction.
In other cases, we may be running a school, or community project and share the gospel as part of that project in the normal course of the day. Many of our school projects are carried out in partnership with local churches which strengthens that linkage. We call these our humanitarian projects that also share the gospel.
Other projects are carried out as Christians specifically working to meet people's needs as a way to share the gospel with them. Evangelist campaigns, pastoral training, and other projects are carried out. For example, Star of Hope Romania, El Buen Pastor, and Star of Hope Philippines all have these types of outreach.
In Argentina, our partners carry out their efforts with Jesus Christ always presented clearly. In 2009 we sponsored an outdoor campaign that saw some 3,000 make commitments to Christ. The work with the homeless, the sick, and the poor is motivated by our Christian values.
In Kenya, Star of Hope provided Christian libraries and Bible Studies in the prison in Mombasa, Kenya. In one case we saw a man accept Christ, go through the training programs and on the day he was scheduled to be executed, he was freed! His goal, to reach out to other men in other prisons.
In Romania, our work with special needs children is anchored by the working belief that caregivers who have Christ in their hearts are better able to cope and provide the care needed. Star of Hope Romania has made special efforts to minister to the mothers of these very special children.