7. Orphan crisis

“Seventy-three percent of people in the societies of the bottom billion have recently been through a civil war or are still in one.”

— Paul Collier

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A brother and sister in NHU's extension program

“One of the factors known to impede growth is war,” writes Paul Collier. In Uganda, a brutal civil war in the 1980's caused a major orphan crisis in the country. That epidemic of fatherlessness inspired NHU's founder to found the mission work.

During our orientation, Joanna introduced us to NHU's way of bringing in and caring for children from the surrounding community. Unlike traditional orphanages, where needy children are brought to live in dormitory-style buildings with little care or personal attention, NHU distinguishes between types of need.

If a child has family members that lack the resources to care for him or her, NHU will come alongside the family and provide support. Thus they strengthen existing families.

If a child doesn't have a safe place to live or truly has no family members, NHU will bring him or her on-site to live with a family group. Each family group has a Ugandan couple acting as mother and father to their own biological children as well as the orphaned or outcast children living with them. The goal is to model a normal, healthy family relationship for the youth, and to provide a safe home to live in.

In addition, special needs children are cared for through NHU's program, TIJOC. Education, physical therapy, and specialized care are primary components of TIJOC. Similarly to NHU's general orphan care, TIJOC both houses special needs kids on-site and provides support to local families with differently abled children.

Paul Collier explains, “To my mind, development is about giving hope to ordinary people that their children will live in a society that has caught up with the rest of the world. Take that hope away and the smart people will use their energies not develop their society but to escape from it.” Hope begins with children—not in expecting something from them, but in providing a better world for them.