Beginning “next steps” in long-term Haiti earthquake relief
One month after the 7.0 magnitude earthquake shattered Haiti, survivors brace for yet another challenge: the rainy season, which is expected to create even more health problems for homeless Haitians living in flimsy tents and haphazard refugee camps.
Helping to provide more stable shelter, water purification, and sanitation are among the “next steps” LCMS World Relief and Human Care (LCMS WR-HC) and the ministry’s many partners are tackling as part of the Synod’s long-term response in a poor country plunged into even greater need.
Assisting local Lutheran congregations so they can reach out to hurting communities will continue to be the focus of LCMS relief efforts in the months and years to come, says Rev. Glenn F. Merritt, director of Disaster Response for LCMS WR-HC.
Merritt and an LCMS assessment team traveled to Haiti just days after the Jan. 12 disaster that killed an estimated 200,000 and left 1.5 million homeless. He later joined a another LCMS team offering support to their exhausted Haitian counterparts – men who serve congregations as they cope with their own families’ losses. The LCMS pastors also comforted earthquake survivors in hospitals and refugee camps. “After a disaster, people need someone to listen as they speak about what has happened,” said LCMS WR-HC’s Rev. Carlos Hernandez, another team member.
The Synod’s mercy arm sent a Mercy Medical Teams (MMT) of health care volunteers to staff a clinic at First Lutheran Church in Jacmel and helped open food programs at Lutheran churches in the hard-hit cities of Jacmel and Port-au-Prince. Today, staff working with LCMS World Mission in the neighboring Dominican Republic continue to coordinate shipments of food and water – urgently needed provisions made possible by generous LCMS WR-HC donors who, to date, have given $2.3 million for the Haiti earthquake response.
The needs in Haiti are overwhelming, but LCMS WR-HC donors are helping to make a difference. “Help comes one person at a time,” said Rev. Matthew Harrison, LCMS WR-HC executive director, who provided pastoral care in Haiti after the earthquake. “We are helping people – many, many people – one person at a time.”
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