‘A win-win for everyone involved’
Nyawar Mapieny Gathoul’s baby and siblings are hungry. The father of her six-month-old isn’t around to help and, at just 17, the young mother also cares for her seven siblings because their parents have died. Nyawar is strong, resilient and hardworking. But the family has only enough food for one meal a day. Gathoul and…
Loss that cannot be counted
As millions of civilians continue to flee the devastation of the Russian military invasion of Ukraine, organizations like MCC partner UMAN (Charitable Foundation Uman Help Center) are working to support those who have left everything they know behind. UMAN operates in the Ukrainian city of Uman, about 200 kilometres from the capital of Kyiv. Due…
MCC partners in Ukraine supply essential care
Try to imagine hearing air raid sirens scream out their warning. In your panic, you seek shelter. Your freezing fingers remind you of the warm coat you’ve forgotten back home. Or maybe you pack the car full of blankets and food, planning to flee to a safer location. You hope you won’t get stuck in…
MCC celebrates, serves where its work began
Under shade trees in a city park on June 16, about 40 Anabaptists shared a picnic of corn grits, rye bread and warm cocoa. The unusual menu held symbolic meaning. It was a “relief-kitchen dinner” like those that saved the lives of thousands of Mennonites and other Ukrainians on the brink of starvation in…
‘We became Mennonites’
Welcoming visitors from North America, Ivan Kapelushniy, pastor of Nikolaipolye Mennonite Church, led his congregation of about 15 people in singing “For God So Loved Us” in Russian. “There are no born Mennonites among us,” Kapelushniy said on June 16 as mission worker Mary Raber translated. “We became Mennonites.” Kapelushniy counts himself among the converts.…
MCC partner serves people ‘society doesn’t want’
Natalia Mezentseva oversees a household of “women in difficult circumstances.” With an affirming and instructive place to live, thanks to a Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) partner, their circumstances are better already. A group of visitors on an MCC learning tour heard their stories, cuddled a baby, applauded a child’s poetry recital and prayed with them…
