The Kampala Project

In the poorer suburbs, on the south-eastern outskirts of Kampala, you will find Pastor Paddy Luzige and his team reaching out to the street-children. It takes time to win the trust of a child to whom life has been unkind; they view strangers with suspicion and are not easily won over.

A street scene in Pastor Paddy's area

The street-children are drawn to the children's activities at Pastor Paddy's church and through this he is able to build up a relationship with them. Until the child is ready to leave the streets the work is purely pastoral, ensuring the well-being of the child as far as is possible. Once the child is ready, the search starts for a suitable local relative who is willing to take in the child and care for him/her.

You may wonder how a relative can be found so easily. The answer is that Uganda is a tribal country and consequently most people have a lot of relatives, many more than we do. It is rare to find a person without any relatives at all.

Great care is taken in finding a relative who will love and nurture the child; there are some who would just treat the child as a servant. It may seem strange to us, but in Uganda children are not always perceived in the same way that we, in Europe, do. For this reason Pastor Paddy also runs classes to teach parenting skills to those who take in children.

For the most part, the relatives who take in a child simply cannot afford to pay for that child's education. The child's only hope of receiving an education, therefore, is if a sponsor can be found to pay for his/her schooling. There are, of course, many more needy children than sponsors.

It costs only £15.00 per month to send a child to school - certainly not a lot by European standards. Please sponsor a child today. If you can afford it then sponsor more than one. Give back a little of what you receive to change a child's life and give him/her new hope for the future. If you are a UK taxpayer then please give via Gift Aid, this adds an extra 28% to what you give.