As ROWAN is in Uganda, we thought it would be fun to share more about the country with our readers. This is a beautiful country with diverse animal & plant life, plus many other mysteries to unravel.
A Crown of Gold
This magnificent, showy bird is the Crowned Crane (or Balearica regulorum gibbericeps). It is the national bird of Uganda, appearing on their flag & coat of arms.
Crowned Facts
Unfortunately the crowned crane is listed as endangered, as their habitat is slowly being depleted for crop land. They are interesting, however as they are monogamous & appear to mate for life (up to 22 years). They also both participate in nest building & incubating the eggs. Like humans (& bears) they are omnivores that eat both meats & plants. These birds are worth keeping around.
Home from school for the holiday recess, our children convene at the Hall of Hope for the Holiday Program, where they build community across all class years. Older students, such as Jonathan Wagaba, a current medical student, and Ronald Dyole, an aspiring teacher, take the opportunity to mentor secondary school students on career choices. They encourage their younger peers to contemplate their school experiences and pursue vocations that align with their interests and individual giftings. The Holiday Program provides an incredible opportunity for older students to serve as leaders in the community while younger students gain insights and inspiration from their older mentors.
Ronald Dyole (wearing an orange T-shirt) shares his thoughts on career aspirations with secondary school students.
Beyond the opportunity for sharing and learning, the Holiday Program, which runs 5 days a week, entertains students with a range of activities. Students receive health check-ups, eat nutritious meals, and play games for hours on end. Favorite sports include soccer, jump rope, and netball, a thrilling combo of basketball and volleyball.
Soon, new posts will be rolling your way, written by a name that you may not recognize. That’s me! Chanel Varney – and I’d love to give a proper introduction to you, my cherished ROWAN friends.
I originally hail from Southern California, but for the past three and a half years, I’ve been in Cambridge, Massachusetts studying biology at Harvard. Studying here has been a tremendous blessing, straight from the hand of God. One of the greatest joys of my experience has been my Christian community. Harvard College Faith & Action is a multi-denominational Christian club on campus, started by the Christian Union. With this group, God has brought me closer and closer to His heart, and without this group, I would’ve never known about ROWAN.
After returning from a mission trip to South Africa in December 2018, I knew that God was compelling me to seek out another opportunity to go abroad and meet more of my family in Him. I recall looking at dozens of missions opportunities online, but when I saw the ROWAN trip (posted on the Christian Union website), I immediately felt that I would be going.
In May 2019, I went from not being able to point Uganda out on a map, to personally cherishing a Ugandan community that maps hardly know: the rural, grassy Mawanga. Before my trip, I knew what ROWAN stood for – “Rural Orphans and Widows AIDS Network” – but afterward, I fully grasped who ROWAN stands for.
ROWAN serves a community that loves the same God and that is loved by the same God as me. A community that rejoiced to see me, lavishing me in embraces and enthusiastic welcome. They welcomed me into their homes with more hospitality than I ever found in my own heart. They blessed me with generous gifts, earned by incredibly hard labor because they wanted to communicate their love for me: a stranger, I felt, but to them, a true sister.
Have you ever been humbled by another’s generosity? Perhaps Jesus’s? … whose unmerited kindness leads us to repentance (Romans 2:4). If so, then you will know how I felt during my trip. I was given WAY more than I could ever return – I’m not talking materially, but about something much more precious and everlasting: Jesus’s love. I will graduate with a degree from one of the most prestigious and challenging universities in the world, but something much more applaudable and difficult to accomplish is to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:31). The people of ROWAN do this inexplicably well, and through these people, God reminds me that greatness in this kingdom – becoming educated, rich, powerful – has no value in His Kingdom. Instead …
“Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3-4).
“Whoever wants to be first must take the last place and be the servant of everyone else” (Mark 9:35).
I need to be reminded of these truths weekly. Daily. Hourly. Many of us do. I feel blessed that God works through this community to be that reminder in my life. I’m excited and honored to write stories about ROWAN so that others may be equally as blessed.
As someone who loves to write, I often journal, and on occasion, the Holy Spirit will write through me. If you’d like to read what He revealed to me as I reflected on my trip to Mawanga, here’s the link.
Thanks for reading. I hope you are blessed by the stories to come!
no more time wasted walking countless hours to get to the Hall of Hope
time + energy reinvested in education + business
fewer safety threats along the way + more accessible healthcare
field trip + exploration opportunities
Pastor Paul made the announcement at the Christmas Party. Check out the video:
There was dancing, praying, singing, and lots of laughing. People tried ice cream for the first time ever, they thanked God, and the excitement was off the charts. See for yourself:
Remember when we fundraised for the Hall of Hope for Christmas in 2017?
Here it is: everyone gathered under one roof.
We’re praising God for how far we’ve come in the last decade and so excited to see where he takes us in the coming decade.
If you’re like most of us, each year while shopping for Christmas gifts you might catch yourself thinking,
“This is great. But it’s all just… stuff.”
Relatable? Well, you don’t have to feel that way today.
Reports divulge that on Cyber Monday in 2018, Americans spent $7.9 billion. On stuff. We’re still waiting to see what the numbers are this year, but we all know one thing: they’ll be up there.
In the midst of the chaos created during what ought to be the most peaceful time of the year,
It’s easier than wading through online shopping ads, it’s faster than cutting coupons, and it’s just downright fun to be part of something important. When you give a gift in someone’s honor, you’ll help them feel confident that they left this world a bit better than they found it. With this gift, you’re saying,
“I know you’re the type of person who would care about something like this; I know you’re a helper. I appreciate that about you. That’s why I gave this gift in your honor.”
Do you have a child or grandchild who rides a bus? Or maybe your little tribe is just starting to feel like they’ve mastered the bus schedule this year. Are you friends or neighbors with any bus drivers? Do you know any teachers who work at schools where buses safely pick up and drop off students each day? How many buses will you see while you’re driving to work tomorrow?
To many of us, buses have become commonplace. We see school buses, public transit city buses, double-decker buses, mini-buses, shuttle buses, luxury coach buses… but in Mawanga, most folks still get around with the same transportation they were born with: their own two feet.
When you give a bus pass in someone’s honor, that gift restores up to 10 hours in an orphan or widow’s day that they would have spent walking. That could be 70 hours in a week… or up to 3,640 hours in a year. Imagine the possibilities.
We just received heartbreaking news that Tikabula Kafuko passed away yesterday at 86-and-a-half years old.
She will be remembered as a world-changer who had twice as much spunk and life in her than most people have at 25. Tikabula dearly loved to dance, was known to speak boldly, and (as Pastor Paul says) you could always count on her to “make funs” (make jokes). She played an integral part of our pineapple and passion fruit gardens at ROWAN. She enjoyed tending to her small garden at her home, and the community will always remember how hard she worked. Here are some pictures of her gardening:
For the last few years of her long and beautiful life, her body struggled with arthritis and joint pain. Ultimately, she passed away of cancer in her intestines. We would like to thank Tikabula’s sponsors, Norma and Philip Tubbs, for helping make her final years her very best. She called ROWAN “family” and never missed an event. Life expectancy in Uganda is currently about 60 years old, and we are so thankful for so many years beyond that where we were able to learn from and laugh with Tikabula. We are missing her deeply but thankful to know she is resting in the Father’s arms.
If you ever had the privilege of meeting Tikabula, we would love to hear and share your stories and memories to honor her legacy.
The International Day of the Girl was last week, but we still want you to meet some of our neat young ladies!
She recently finished higher education. With a heart for her nation and especially the women there, she determined to study mass communication and journalism. Her dream is to speak up for women’s rights by documenting stories in Uganda so that each coming generation is one step closer to gender equality. In a country where women haven’t been allowed to own land, Uganda is coming a long way. But paving the road for women’s rights is not going to be a quick or simple task. Young ladies like Mariam represent the way forward, but they can’t do it alone!
Mariam successfully completed our program, but many other young ladies still need your help on their journey!
When our son, Jake, was at Dartmouth College, he spent part of a summer working with ROWAN in Uganda. Read more about that here! As a result, we began our first sponsor relationship with a young man named Mugabi Cyrus. Jake met Cyrus in the village and said Cyrus was a strong and eager participant in the leadership training sessions. As we prayed about someone to sponsor, God spoke swiftly and clearly that is should be Cyrus.
Mugabi Cyrus
And here’s the thing—while we felt good about helping Cyrus, we had no idea that he would give us far more than we could ever give him. He loves us without reservation and calls us family. As we pray for him he prays for us. He worked hard in school and got an art degree—he is very talented. He calls our sons, Jake and Jonah, his brothers, and my husband and I, mom and dad. He is our “son” that we’ve never met. He has taught us uniquely more about the love of God. His faith in the most difficult circumstances has been a light to our family.
Cyrus graduated out of the sponsorship program but he is still our son, friend, and prayer partner. When co-founder Kelsey Hargadine visited Uganda in May, Cyrus gave her a backpack he made for us—made fully by his hand. She mailed it to us in Washington state and I cried and smiled at the beautiful stitching, the hand embroidered message, the thoughtfulness of a young man who works hard as an entrepreneur and who is now a volunteer for ROWAN. We are humbled and proud to know Cyrus and excited to see how God loves and leads him in the days ahead.
Jonah Casale, in the USA, holds the backpack handmade by his brother-in-Christ, Mugabi Cyrus!
ROWAN would like to share with you some breaking news from Uganda. The Ugandan government is tightening up their demands and requirements on NGO’s (non-governmental organizations that are nonprofit). There have been too many briefcase NGO’s (fraudulent nonprofit organizations set up only to obtain money from donors but having no programs on the ground) in the country, so the government is making every NGO, including ours, go through complex hoops to re-register and confirm our legitimacy.
The good news is, ROWAN has favor in the government and goes above and beyond with financial integrity and with our our local work in our districts. The only difficulties we face are that this process takes time and money; local leadership must travel to Kampala and spend time gathering data and filling out all the paperwork to meet deadlines.
ROWAN used to be a community-based organization (based upon our size), but since we have grown across four Districts, we are now an official NGO. ROWAN has been registered locally since we started in 2008. We value the importance of local authorities and laws regulating our work. We pray this intensive process will only further validate the work and ministry happening at ROWAN! Please join us in prayer for a smooth process and positive outcome as we continue to serve our many members. Thank you!
Kelsey Hargadine honors local ROWAN leaders. May, 2019.
It doesn’t matter if you are from the west and have never been to Africa. It doesn’t matter if you are from Africa and have never been to a western country. Our circumstances may be vastly different but our capacity to grieve and care for one another are human capacities.
Will you let me introduce you to Daniel Okola? The ROWAN team met Daniel less than than four months ago when they visited Uganda. Daniel’s wife just died in March, in childbirth. While this pain may be unfathomable to many of us, Daniel continues to love and care for his eight children. Daniel had no livable house and his biggest challenges were finding places for his children to sleep at night and his inability to work due to caring for his children. When the team visited Daniel, he told them he receives strength from looking up at the face of God.
ROWAN put out a call for help to build Daniel and his children a house. Many people donated and the money was raised. Today, Daniel’s house is under construction and soon he and his family will be living together in their very own home! ROWAN thanks everyone who donated for helping Daniel in this difficult time and transforming his sorrow to hope with a house for his family. There is a long road ahead but a safe home for his family to live and sleep in together is life-changing for each one of them.
Daniel and most of his children have now been sponsored and we praise God for that. The last child that needs sponsoring is sweet Godfrey. Would you consider changing Godfrey’s life and supporting Daniel in his desire to be a father that stays with his children? There is so much strength in a father to stay with his children in such a dire situation. In addition to the loss of a mother, culturally, many men run away or send the children to family members. Daniel is choosing to stay and we want to support and bless that! Thank you for considering sponsoring Godfrey:
Look for an update soon on the Okola house and family and please continue to pray for them as they navigate the loss of a wife and mother. Thank you very much for reading their story and comprehending that no matter where we live on this earth, we are bound in compassion, grief, and love, as the family of God.
“While other worldviews lead us to sit in the midst of life’s joys, foreseeing the coming sorrows, Christianity empowers its people to sit in the midst of this world’s sorrows, tasting the coming joy.”
—Tim Keller
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