Help Children in Congo – Project Overview

Saint Thomas Parish has been helping the last few years with a project that the Augustinians’ missionaries have in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It is a project to help abandoned children in the street because their family has no economical possibilities to have them or they are children of the war, without parents. In Kinshasa there are more than 25 000 children in the street, without any education, some of them with sicknesses like AIDS and those that proceed from no hygienic condition.

The Augustinians opened a centre called St. Rita that tries to help these children. The priest responsible for the centre is P. Guillaume Migbisiegbe, OSA. But the centre was closed down as a result of civil unrest. So now the children are in smaller Augustinian orphanages and with adoptive parents. Some of these families already have 8–10 of their own children. St. Thomas parish helps to pay school fees for these children.

The cost of school fees and stationery for one child is €37 (about 1000 CZK) per year.

Situation of Congo Children in 2007

Some of them are suspected of having HIV. Their health is not really good enough. Others enjoy of good health though they face fierce poverty in the different families they live in. Any benefactor will think of an additional donation for clothes and other tuition fees and medical care. Apart from the school fees problems, the children are facing the problems of clothes, toys, and health care facilities. In the name of all the families who take care of the children in Kinshasa, I thank you very much for your compassionate contribution to the future of these children.

P. Guillaume Migbisiegbe, OSA