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Happy Mother’s Day!
As we enter this special weekend when we celebrate our mothers, motherhood, maternal bonds, and the influence of mothers in society, we wanted to put our newsletter in your hands.
Mother’s Day has its roots in a Christian tradition called “Mothering Sunday”. On the 4th Sunday in Lent, people returned to their “mother church” – where they were baptized, the local parish church, or the nearest cathedral – for a special service. It evolved to a day when domestic servants were given a day off to visit their mother church. It kept evolving through the 19th Century in North America. In the USA, Mother’s Day was created in 1908 and became an official holiday in 1914.
As an organization committed to fullness of life for every child, World Vision knows that the way to build child well-being naturally involves helping mothers. Mothers are usually the primary caregivers in a family, and are often the ones most involved with children’s health, nutrition, and education.
Our part of the work focuses on women and mothers’ ability to provide well for their children. Many of our core interventions brings special support to women.
- Empowered Worldview training. While this is used with ALL members of a community and family, as people begin to understand themselves, that they are image bearers of God, and what the Biblical model is for a family, women dis-proportionally benefit. They are seen as partners in the family and household, and often freed from dependency to an empowered person, able to contribute to the family’s needs by running their own small business or farming operation.
- Savings Groups. Around the world, women make up 80% of the members of savings groups – which World Vision is now calling Savings for Transformation groups. This is where people learn to save money regularly, learn about what finance is (how credit works, interest rates, repayments), and how to take and repay a loan. Many women learn how to run and improve a business or farm from their fellow members, and then get a loan from the group to make their ideas a reality.
- Microfinance services – credit, savings, insurance. 70 % of VisionFund International’s clients (our microfinance subsidiary operating in 29 countries) are women. Financial services allow existing small businesses and farms to significantly grow and improve. VisionFund also works to improve financial literacy for their clients. 98% of all loans are repaid.
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As women’s farms and businesses grow, we see children increasingly attending school, improved nutrition and food security for children and family members, and early investments by women usually include improving the family’s home.
So, as we celebrate Mother’s Day, we celebrate all of those who are helping mothers in the developing world move out of extreme poverty and provide well for their children and families.
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Women's Empowerment Fund Update
Please watch this webinar, originally created to celebrate International Women’s Day. Through discussion with donor Gina Buser and our staff, this is a great overview explaining what the Women’s Empowerment Fund is, how it works, how it is growing, and our plans going forward.
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Do you know that Christopher Shore has an instagram account just for his travels with World Vision? You should follow him: