Hardworking women
reach out
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| Refreshment time is always a highlight of programs for children. Volunteers distribute coffee, soft drinks and sandwiches as well as the Gospel in this Córdoba program supported by the Argentine Bible Society. Argentina. Photo: UBS/Larry Jerden (ARG01DJ-95.JPG) |
Of his volunteers, he adds, none are more active than those of the Bible Society’s Women’s Auxiliary Commission.
“The Women’s Commission has eight regional committees. Five are served by the office in Córdoba, which covers 10 provinces. They have 1,300 volunteers.”
Córdoba has up-market shops and apartments, but many of its one million inhabitants live in extreme poverty, and the Women’s Commission is particularly active in the slum areas. In Casala, for example, the women volunteers take part in a neighbourhood children’s project that includes games and Bible lessons for the youngsters, health advice for mothers, refreshments for all – and even an agricultural project aimed at developing a community farm.
Challenges
Although many of the project children attend a Brethren church, there are plenty of challenges. Even as volunteer Betty Reyes was telling Bible stories to an outdoor gathering, one boy not yet a teenager was showing his friends a can of glue he was sniffing from.
Says Ms Reyes, “We need some men to come and help control the boys.” But regardless of the challenges, the women volunteers press on.
Further north, the Women’s Commission
in the town of Jujuy is relatively new but has already been involved
in Scripture distribution to schools, the police, government offices,
prisons and reform schools. And in flood relief work: floods following
storms in north-west Argentina in April 2001 left at least six people
dead and, in Jujuy province, made some 2,000 homeless.
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Even as volunteer Betty Reyes was telling Bible stories to an outdoor gathering, one boy not yet a teenager was showing his friends a can of glue he was sniffing from. |
The group responded to the needs of flood victims by providing Bibles, clothes and even coffee cups and spoons.
“The people in the flooded areas had lost everything,” says member Nancy de Galean. “We also gave out 3,300 New Testaments and 3,300 Selections and began a Bible study with the governor and the mayor,” she adds.Distributing Scriptures in the main street where a fair was being held also provoked a good deal of interest.
“We got very good reactions from professionals and from all kinds of people,” she says.
“They were very grateful and many were surprised. Their reaction was, ‘During these times of crisis in Argentina, no-one has given us anything.’
“Many children asked for Scriptures for their parents and families. The parents of the children who received them added that it would be good if we could bring more materials, including Christian films.”
One volunteer encountered a man who would not accept what he called a ‘Protestant’ Bible, so she obtained a Roman Catholic one from the Bible Society.
“He was an alcoholic and I wanted to help him,” says volunteer Karina Velarde. “Today he is a born-again, charismatic Catholic Christian.”
The help the women offer is not limited
to Bibles. Viviana Zerpa is President of another Women’s Commission,
in the town of Liberator San Martin, not far from Jujuy.
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“He was an alcoholic and I wanted to help him,” says volunteer Karina Velarde. “Today he is a born-again, charismatic Catholic Christian.” |
“We try to help poor people spiritually and also physically,” she explains. “Sometimes we give them clothes. We help them any way we can.”
Like their sisters in Jujuy, the women of San Martin use Selections, New Testaments, children’s materials and books on Christian ethics in their outreach.
“We take advantage of holidays because we can find everyone together in the same place,” Mrs Zerpa says. “We have special Selections for different holidays,” she explains.
Words of hope
“The Day of the Dead Selections offer words of hope about the Resurrection. On the Day of the Dead last year I handed out 2,000 Selections in one hour by myself.”
“Sometimes we give away Bibles when we preach,” she adds.
As in Jujuy, the reactions to their ministry have been favourable.
She says that the women’s pastors are very supportive of their efforts – as are Mr Figueroa and others in the Bible Society. And when he sees their results, it is no wonder that the General Secretary would like to see 9,000 more volunteers just like them. (WR 379/7 - 9.03)