A Home for the Orphans of Togo
Various armed conflicts, poverty, and the crisis of survival, along with the significant age gap between parents and children, have unjustly rendered many children orphans in Africa. The family constitutes the natural and fundamental element of society and is entitled to its protection.
The Orthodox Church stands by the family with responsibility and love, considering it a “domestic Church.” Therefore, the Greek Orthodox Holy Diocese of Benin, Togo, and Burkina Faso has chosen to preach through actions in the poorest countries within its jurisdiction.
Measures for the protection of the family and each child include those aimed at strengthening the natural family, as well as measures for the protection of children outside their natural family, who are sometimes found abandoned and are now referred to as orphans.
No child asked or wished to be an orphan. Whenever a child is orphaned, what usually follows in their life is endless darkness and despair. This is something that cannot leave us indifferent as the Church.
The orphan is the relic of the Church. As Saint John Chrysostom beautifully emphasizes: The feeding of the poor, the protection of the wronged, the care of the displaced, the assistance of the afflicted, the provision for orphans, the alliance with widows—these are the relics of the Church, these are the treasures that befit it, and they provide both us with pleasure and you with benefit, or rather, both you with pleasure and benefit.
For this reason, our beloved friends of the mission, we humbly ask for your contribution, your support in saving the orphaned children whom God has entrusted to us. The house you see is our first Orphanage, which will provide warmth and comfort to 50 orphaned children from Togo. We need monthly support of 2,500 euros for their sustenance. Orphanhood, my beloved brethren, is not a sin, but the indifference of adults to secure children’s well-being is a sin. You are great only when you stoop down and offer a plate of food, a glass of milk to an orphan. Let us give hope and bright smiles to the faces of these children.
From the Holy Diocese of Benin, Togo, and Burkina Faso
