Here in Brazil, May 18th is the National Day of Combatting Child Abuse and the Sexual Exploitation of Children and Teenagers. ReVive has been in this fight for more than five years now.
Today seems to be a good day to announce our plans to open up a SECOND home in Olinda, PE. Most of you will know that this has been a dream for a long time and now, thanks to a generous donation, we’re able to do it (and more!). The house will probably be for new born babies and very young children, both boys and girls. Alongside this new home, we’re also going to open a prevention based project within a local community. This centre will provide a holistic work to entire families in the hope of strengthening them, providing kids work, professional training and a lot of other things in the hope of preventing families from falling into risk or abusive situations. We’ll be chatting with the local government and the judicial services over the next few months about how to implement these new services.
Another thing is that ReVive will have an even stronger focus on encouraging the sponsorship, fostering and adoption of children and teenagers in care. We hope to partner with the local churches to try and change the way fostering and adoption is viewed locally and facilitate churches in supporting and encouraging adoption and fostering in their congregations. We’ll also be involved at the local government level to help implement a foster family system with the hope that one day ReVive will have to close the doors to our homes (and all the other homes) because every child who needs to be brought into care is placed in a loving foster family.
However, until that day arrives, our homes will always offer a place of love, protection and full support so that children and teenagers may have their lives restored and hope renewed for a better future.
We’ll always count on the help and support of our friends, churches, colleagues in the child protection network and the professionals in the judicial and local government. We’re in this fight together!