Blessed with the local churches

This summer update is to honour our partners all over Albania – the local churches and their members!
During summer it is usually hard to continue ministry in the prisons due to holidays and unbearable high temperatures inside prison.
They have been faithfully serving prisoners and their families over the long hot summer. The award in the picture is for you!

One church in Durres takes care of 2 of our children and their families from our ‘Secured Childhood’ sponsor program. Whenever we bring support, the church always at least doubles it!! This summer the church took the children for 2 weeks for summer camp and gave them an unforgettable experience.

The pastor from the local church in Rrogozhine has built a strong relation with the inmates as well as with the prison staff. All summer long he has been visiting the prisoners, and some of the prison staff now visit his church on Sunday.

In the midst of the hot summer, a local church offered professional dental care for free, also to several of ‘our families’. These people would never be able to afford this treatment themselves. Another church payed for the special glasses one boy desperately needed.

While our chaplains from the female prison in Tirana had their holidays, not a single activity was interrupted. The volunteers from the church continued to care for the women in prison.
One lady was just released and was completely taken care of by the church volunteers when she took part in a women’s conference this summer.

An ex-prisoner has been released about a year ago, after he had been a regular partaker in our activities. He found himself a good job and is now able to take care of his family and is again a regular visitor of a church nearby.
One of his fellow inmates has been released recently, and could not find a job because of his crime-past. After the first one heard this, he mediated with his boss for his former inmate, and got him a job too.

One family was experiencing shame and isolation because of the shameful fact why the father is in prison. Nobody wanted to have anything to do with this family.
We could connect a local church to this family, initially through the child support program.
The church has started to invite the family for meetings, and openly involved them into all kind of events. Now the spell of shame is broken.

So many churches have been faithfully serving prisoners, children and families of prisoners, truly serving them as the church that is mentioned in Hebrews 10: And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works,

A Christian broadcast organisation has offered to make a professional video about our work, and worked hard to get all the necessary footage in limited time. We will keep you informed about the results!

All these stories, and many more, make us realise that we are indeed all members of one body: For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. 1Cor.12

Allow me to bless you with a part from St. Patricks’ breastplate:

May you arise today, through
God’s strength to pilot you,
God’s might to uphold you,
God’s wisdom to guide you,
God’s eye to look before you,
God’s ear to hear you,
God’s word to speak for you,
God’s hand to guard you,
God’s shield to protect you,
God’s host to save you

Fred Westerink
director Shkbsh – Prison Fellowship Albania