Love Mercy

The month of May will see the beginning of construction of the Kristina Achuma Clinic in Awake village. Our sister organisation, Achon Uganda Children’s Fund is currently heading to Uganda to begin the groundbreaking. Awake Village is 42 miles from Lira, the site of the nearest healthcare facility. The vast majority of Awake residents cannot afford transportation to Lira or the care offered there. As such, every day, people in this region suffer, and in some cases, die needlessly because they do not have access to routine, preventative health care or emergency medical attention. Our clinic will provide primary medical care including triage and appropriate treatment, disease testing, inoculation, medication dispensing and education. Our staff will be comprised of Ugandan MDs and RNs as well as a general manager and staff augmented by periodic visits from US-based doctors and nurses. This is a huge fundraising project for us, with the clinic set to cost an estimated $90 000. Whic...

This time of year is busy and exciting for Love Mercy. The middle of March was the beginning of the rainy season in Uganda, the time when all of the crops for the year are planted. This means that the second round of our Micro-Loan “Cents for Seeds” project has  begun! After the huge success of our project in the village of Baa, with 107 loans distributed and 104 returned to us, we were able to expand our project to include the nearby village of Awake. A total of 547 women have signed up to receive approximately 15kgs of seeds each, of differing varieties, from soya beans, green beans, and also ground nuts. The mood in the villages was excited as the women lined up and received their seeds. They are now being planted, to be grown, harvested and then will contribute to imporiving the quality of live for families and entire villages. The women are asked to return the principal of their seed loan to the Love Mercy Foundation so that we can continue our project. The rest of th...

This article in the  New York Times  explains how researchers and economists are realizing that women hold the key to economic development. Women care for the children that will be tomorrow's leaders. Women have the burden of providing food for their families when there is none. Women feel compassion and mercy towards others who are suffering. It is because of these facts that the Love Mercy Foundation has been targeting women in rebuilding villages that were ravaged by war. It is truly inspiring to see the difference that women around the world can make when unified in spirit and cause. One example of this can be seen the Colour Sisterhood that operates from Hillsong Church. They are supporting an organisation that also works in Uganda, and with the support of thousands of women in the developed world, women who are blessed with plenty are able to give to women in Northern Uganda. One such project has seen the transformation of a place of darkness into a place of light. W...

Uganda will seep into your bones, it will change you, regardless of whether you want it to or not. It's been almost 3 months since our trip to Uganda.  Three months on, I still have vivid images of what we saw there. It's like along the way I took mental images of what moved me the most. Not surprising... It was my prayer before I left, that I would go and I would be moved beyond my own emotions, that I would see it as God does.  I can still hear the beautiful women from baa, singing for us in their church, this, our gift for running the cents for seeds program with them. As they sing I can still see the faces of the ones that bare the scars of the horrible atrocities that were carried out on them during the war. I only just learned of the terrible massacre that happened in that village just 5 years ago, when the LRA stormed into their homes and caused unimaginable pain and bloodshed. Peace has returned, but the scars remain. What amazes me most about  these women is t...

The Love Mercy Foundation is passionate about justice, equality, and especially simple solutions that have life changing effects in the developing world.On our first trip to Uganda in November, the team got to experience these things first hand.    Africa is unlike anyplace I have ever seen before. In some ways, it was exactly as   we expected. There are women who carry things on their heads, kids who smile real big and point and laugh at the pale people, and lots of music and dancing. In other ways it was totally unexpected and nothing could have prepared us for what we would see or do. The media tends to portray Africa as a dark, scary and hopeless place, filled with fear, crime, depressing images of kids with big bellies and no clothes. We did see these types of images with our own eyes, but far from being sad and depressing, We were shocked at the light and hope that radiates from each person. The people are resillient, their lives are often characterised...

In a matter of days we'll be back in Uganda! Except this time with a much clearer purpose! Last time we went there for Julius and Grace's wedding, for a bit of a holiday... really expecting nothing more than to experience Africa, go on a safari and meet Julius's family... I'll never forget the first time I met his kids, the 11 he'd found lying underneath a bus in 2003. When we arrived at the house, they all came running out to the car to greet "Uncle Julius" and his white friends! My heart skipped a beat at how beautiful and innocent they all were, I remember fighting back tears at the thought of what they had been through when the LRA rebels tore through Northern Uganda and meaninglessly killed their parents, how scared they would have been, most of them under 12 years old at the time. The thought of how different our childhoods have been.... thinking back at what I would have been doing at the time all this horrible war was going on. And then the image o...