As part of the collaboration meetings that Caritas Rwanda organizes with the diocesan Caritas to evaluate the implementation of the Caritas Rwanda 2023 General Assembly recommendations, on 6th September 2024, a team from Caritas Rwanda met with the Caritas Gikongoro heads of the departments and exchanged on the different activities carried out by Caritas Gikongoro.
At the beginning of the meeting, the heads of the departments of Caritas Gikongoro presented its different activities. In Social Welfare, there is awareness on Caritas Spirit, assistance for school fees to vulnerable children, assistance to sick for their transport to the hospital, assistance to children with disability, the economic development for vulnerable families, assistance to vulnerable elderly people by providing them with food, clothing and paying their contribution to the community-based health insurance.
In the Caritas Gikongoro area, parishes initiated the census of prisoners and funds are regularly collected to visit them, by two people representing others in the parish. Bishop Célestin Hakizimana of the Gikongoro Diocese, has requested that this activity be spread throughout the whole Diocese. The prisoners of the Nyamagabe prison also benefit from a Holy Mass every week and receive donations of food on Christmas.
To overcome the problem of limited means which is a challenge for assisting more vulnerable people, Caritas Gikongoro has launched a program called “Menya Mugenzi Wawe” (Help your neighbor), where people formerly assisted by Caritas are mobilized to give a small regular contribution intend be used in reaching a large number of vulnerable people.
In Health Department, Caritas Gikongoro manages 11 health centers, where the poorest people are assisted in paying for medical care, while the others are assisted for the contribution of the community-based health insurance. There is also nutritional support, awareness raising and the provision of family planning services by natural methods (PFN).
For the Department of Development, there are various agricultural projects which aim at promoting small farmers. A project aiming at providing seeds and fertilizers, and growing local trees which go together with the different crops without harming them is being carried out. In this department, there is also a project that distributes livestock to obtain manure, and economical cookers as well as creating committees capable of producing and distributing them.
For the Department of Administration and Finance, Caritas Gikongoro plans to create its own income-generating activities for its self-financing.
Regarding the visibility of Caritas, during the meeting, the heads of the departments of Caritas Gikongoro received a short training on the right way to write an article, which will help them developping articles to be published in Caritas Contact and Kinyamateka.
On the point related to the celebration of Caritas Day and the World Day of the Poor, not all of the 19 parishes celebrated them in past years, but for this year all of them will do it because this year’s Caritas Gikongoro General Assembly recommended it.
Awareness raising on the Charity Month
In order to increase the productivity of the Charity month aimed at helping the vulnerable, Caritas Gikongoro staff members have been doing the awareness campaign in the 19 parishes. In addition, the Caritas committee members conduct the door-to-door awareness raising in the basic ecclesial communities, calling on everyone to contribute for the Charity. The message signed by Bishop Anaclet, the president of Caritas Rwanda regarding the Charity month is also read in every celebration of Mass, as well as the campaign is conducted in schools.
At the end of the meeting, Caritas Gikongoro staff expressed their gratitude for such meetings organized by Caritas Rwanda in the diocesan Caritas, because the exchange will enable them to improve their work.
After the meeting, the Caritas Rwanda and Caritas Gikongoro team visited the Centre Saint François d’Assise Kitabi, which assists children with disability, under the management of the Penitent Sisters of Saint Francis of Assisi.