Friday, September 22, 2006

Heifer International


I want to say a word in favor of Heifer International. I know, I know Oprah and a bunch of other celebrities have already done it, but read on anyway. If you have been reading and listening, you know that hunger in our country and the world is a big problem. The Heifer Project is a great way to make a dent in world hunger. Why? It's actually a very simple formula, you send your money, that money buys an animal or animals for a family, that family then shares the the offspringby theirs to others, and on and on. And instead of handing out a bag of food, you have given the family a way to raise their food, make money to afford their food, and then to share with the community. Schools, churches, clubs, groups, individuals and yes celebrities have participated, or are doing it now or are making plans to do so. Heifer has a proven approach – almost 60 years in the making – to helping people obtain a sustainable source of food and income.


Heifer has begun a global effort to measure the impact of the organization’s field programs. In short, the impact measurements reveal how people’s lives have changed because of Heifer’s contribution.Between June and August 2005, Heifer conducted two such studies among projects in the North America Program’s South Central Region and among the Latin America and Caribbean Program’s Peru projects. Read the report conducted by a team from the evaluation department of Western Michigan University led by Dr. Michael Scriven. The report identifys 36 different impacts at the individual, community and institutional levels.


Presently the blogring I belong to, revgalblogpals send their profits they make from selling their goods from Cafe Press to Heifer International. The church I am presently pastoring has raised funds for it before, and are making plans to do it again.


So, why don't you consider it, think about it, pray about it, but most of all do something about it.
Don't just sit there, go now, and donate.


Also World Food Day is October 16th. It is the 23rd annual event to alleviate world hunger. And make that donation to the Heifer Project.

3 comments:

hip2b said...

Love Heifer Project!
Friends of ours got married and didn't need anything, so we got them a sheep, sorta. Our VBS one year did their curriculum. Not just a great charity, but excellent stewards.

HeyJules said...

This has been my favorite charity for about three years now. Every Christmas, if I don't know what to get someone, they get a gift in their name to Heifer.

Yesterday, because of this whole "Thirty Days of Nothing" I've been participating in, I called them up and am setting up an automatic deduction every month starting in January. Doing without has taught me it's no fun to be on the other end of poverty. Time to DO something about that.

The Vicar of Hogsmeade said...

A long time ago, over a period of years, my grandfather gave more than one calf to Heifer. He and a few other guys in the church in Missouri would decide together to each give a calf at the same time to make transportation of the calves to the farm in Arkansas easier. He did not often have twins born in his herd but everytime he gave a Heifer calf, there were twins born. He was more than willing to be "down" by one calf that season but never actually was.

I was told that story after I started talking about Heifer Project to my mom. I discovered them through church stuff and had no idea that grandpa had done all that.