Helping Without Harming

 “God, what was I thinking when I told you I would go on a short term trip to Haiti?” 

As we ‘lived’ with COTP for a week, this question was answered many times.

On the Saturday before we left for Haiti, our team attended a ‘Helping without Harming’ workshop in London, sponsored by the Diaconal Ministries Canada and Resonate Global Mission.  We were reminded that effective short term MISSION  trips are really short term LEARN and SERVE trips.  Today’s thoughts are about the LEARN part of our trip.

God took us to Haiti to learn…. And yes, we learned a lot about what it means to ‘Help without Harming’  from COTP leaders, staff and children and also from the broader Lagossette community. 

We learned how COTP lives out their vision of a healthy Christian home and family for every Haitian child.  Pascal, the Family Strengthening director, gave us an overview and tour of programs designed to keep families together;  to provide physical, spiritual, emotional, educational and economic care for at-risk children and families, empowering the most vulnerable and disadvantaged. There are many ways that COTP empowers families and communities. Read on about one of these ways…..

COTP is notified (generally by a neighbouring hospital) when a baby has been born and then is sadly abandoned by his/her family,  perhaps because the child has been born prematurely or with a physical deformation or challenge. Parents are fearful that they have been given this child as a curse, and feel they cannot keep him/her. COTP takes the child into their care and provides nutrition, medicine, and care, while seeking out the biological family. When found, they embrace the family with God’s loving arms, supporting them and showing them the best place for their baby is back in their own family. COTP walks alongside the family as the baby is integrated, all the while supporting with food, medication, counseling, and any needed therapies. As well, COTP commits to educating the family’s village to love and care for the child as their own. Showing Chist’s love as families are empowered to raise their own children! 

If the baby is tiny or very sick, he/she stays in the Temporary Care home, cared for by nursing staff. The parents are encouraged to visit and learn how to care for their child, and when he/she is well enough to go home, ongoing care is provided by COTP nursing staff.

In the future, COTP hopes to open up a Respite Home on campus where parents can bring their child for a short while. This may be due to sickness in the family, economic challenges, or other temporary crises. The family will be given assistance and support as needed until the child is able to return home again.

Sometimes the biological family of the abandoned baby cannot be found. Then COTP will place the child in a Haitian foster home and walk alongside this family, equipping them to nurture this precious child, created in God’s image to live a life of service, each day planned by God. 

Finally, if this is not possible, COTP will care for and keep the child, placing them in foster care with international house parents on campus in the hopes of adopting these children internationally. During our  campus tour led by Abby, our volunteer coordinator, and Melissa, the On-Campus Care coordinator, we saw the family-style homes where 5-8 children of various ages live with house parents, who nurture and love each child entrusted to them until they go to their forever homes. The Joy House, the Grace House, the Promise House are three of the seven homes where children are loved and cared for within a family setting, in preparation for their transition to an adoptive home. The love, concern and joy that exudes from each house parent for each of their children mirrors the sacrificial love that Christ shows all of His followers. And the look of joy in the children’s eyes for their parents- such love!!!

It was such an incredible blessing to see how God leads COTP to help Haitian families to raise their own loved children and to provide adoptive homes for those who cannot go to their biological homes.

Children of the Promise...reflecting God’s promise to each child!