BLOG
Caring for orphaned and vulnerable children through family-based living environments, discipleship and education, empowering future leaders to build healthy communities.
Restoring Hope Annual Report 2022: Highlights, Challenges and Finances
Challenges On The Ground in Orphan and Vulnerable Children Care:
The above photo shows a few of the “challenges by the numbers”:
3 – Number of pastors lost to Covid or accidents in the past three years.
14 – Number of our current students choosing vocational training instead of a traditional college degree, which after counseling and academic evaluation, Restoring Hope supports and encourages.
15 – Number of youth dropping out of Restoring Hope the past five years due to lack of interest in studies, vocational training or reunified family circumstances.
33 – Youth who have been arranged in early marriage* as is practiced in village life, usually ages 16 – 18.
We share these challenges with transparency as the work ongoing in South Asia can be complex due to cultural and traditional customs. From our Annual Report we highlight these and we look into these specific areas in 2022. As we create further benchmarks and understand the ways our team can focus on “problem areas” of the work, our hope is to continue reaching the mission.
Earning a college diploma is rare for the servant caste and agricultural villages of South Asia that are often left out of the rest of “rising” South Asia. The majority of Restoring Hope children and families subsist on day-to-day basic essentials until their education offers new opportunities. Restoring Hope has always aimed to help children learn their way out of poverty and become mature servant leaders who follow Jesus.
There will always be challenges in the work and we wanted to share some of these with hope that these areas can improve. One area of challenge for the team was this one in particular:
33 – Youth who have been arranged in early marriage* as is practiced in village life, usually ages 16 – 18.
| Arranged Marriages in South Asian Culture: |
|---|
| *These early arranged marriages by families are provoked by cultural and rural customs and fears. However sudden, Restoring Hope’s pastors and staff on the ground support these (primarily) girls and couples emotionally and spiritually through their early marriages. |
The first two years of pandemic lockdowns meant there were very few times of wedding celebrations. Initially this number was 5 arranged marriages in 2021 and the number jumped to a total of 33 in 2022. Why? We know many of the families delayed telling pastors so the idea that the common custom is against what we hope for the girls is understood. We continue to provide the training and opportunity, yet the customs are deeply entrenched in this society. Sadly, these girls may not have the future we hoped for (college graduates), but we are confident their place in the church community and under the pastor and pastor’s wife was not in vain or forgotten. We hope that the time in our programs will have a lasting impact in their lives, knowing God, and having a pastor and church family to connect with in the future too. We ensure that our pastors remain connected and supportive of the new couple in this new season of marriage life for which they were not ready.
Some of our precious girls
HIGHLIGHTS BY THE NUMBERS
We also have “highlights by the numbers” included in the annual report which are:
24 – Large scale regional gatherings of Restoring Hope churches during the 2023 summer and Christmas celebrations.
25 – Graduates from college, the first in their families, who have come through the Restoring Hope ministry.
86 – Pastors, social workers and support staff committed to the holistic restoration of these 700 orphaned and vulnerable children and their caregiving families.
150 – Families with two parents but vulnerable to economic hardship who are part of Restoring Hope’s “Family Strengthening” efforts through local village churches.
212 – Average annual Restoring Hope funding partners the past five years.
250 – Students expected to be in college or vocational training school in June
550 – Families with an orphaned child who have lost one or both biological parents and are a part of a Restoring Hope church.
700 – Total children (and almost as many families) being served by Restoring Hope churches in our region of South Asia.
Some “Highlights By the Numbers” in the Annual Report 2022
As we summarize our annual averages, we look forward to seeing the futures of 700 children with such potential.
In the last image, we share the “Finances” of expenses, income, and these two summaries:
$428,000 Donations to Restoring Hope in 2022.
$462,000 Average annual donations to Restoring Hope the past five years.
We know that the blessing of receiving donations from many of you, longtime supporters, has helped hundreds of children receive an education starting all the way back 15 years ago in early elementary school!
From the Co-Director’s, Sean and Paige: “This is the first time we have created an annual report. As a ministry of Operation Saturation, which remains the parent 501c3 for Restoring Hope, our financial information has always been within the Operation Saturation annual report, but this year we wanted to inform our partners in a more direct way. In this report we will discuss triumphs as well as challenges, but we want to both celebrate and inform as to what God has done in the precious lives of these children and families who have made the commitment to stick to hope, a restored hope, in the face of early life tragedy.”
If you would like to share the impact that has been made, please use this infographic with some highlights from Restoring Hope’s Annual Report 2022.
Please feel free to see the full version or download the Annual Report below:
LEAVE A REPLY
Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *
Contact Us
