Plenty of work for Texas Baptists in Haiti

Haitians need help, and they need it fast. 

Robert Shehane recently returned from a four-week stint in Haiti seeking missions opportunities and potential Church2Church partnerships on behalf of Texas Baptists in the first of what will be several trips to the region.

Haitian children gather at a church. At least 160 children on the streets of Grand-Goâve can’t afford their school tuition. Texas Baptists are being encouraged to provide funds for tuition and school supplies. (PHOTO/Courtesy of Robert Shehane)

Homelessness is just one of many problems caused by the January earthquake that devastated Haiti. There are 200,000 people throughout the country currently living in the floodplains in tents, under tarps and in makeshift shelters. Food is scarce. Clean water is even scarcer.

“When I was there, it would get up to 130 degrees inside my tent during the day,” said Shehane, a retired Southern Baptist Convention International Mission Board missionary. “When I went to bed at night, it was about 105 inside the tent.”

The biggest concern right now isn’t the scorching heat, but the coming rains. Haiti’s mountain ranges collect water, causing flash flooding and even mudslides, he said.

“Rainy season comes into full force in July or August, so there’s a real time crunch,” Shehane said. “We need to get these houses up and get people in decent shelter before the rains start. The people are also vulnerable to hurricanes, and hurricane season is just around the corner. When hurricanes hit, what’s going to happen to them? There is a definite sense of urgency to get these people into homes.”

Shehane has identified two main areas where Texas Baptists’ help is needed. The first is Grand-Goâve, about 40 miles southwest of Port-au-Prince, and the nearby Petit-Goâve. The second is Delmas, a major city near Port-au-Prince. 

Building homes is the first among several priorities for volunteers in Haiti. In Grand-Goâve, part of the reconstruction plan provides work for local church members by hiring them to do reconstruction of destroyed and damaged homes.

Mission teams can plug into the work that’s already going on, and when they leave, construction doesn’t have to come to a halt.

The second priority is rebuilding the school owned by Grand-Goâve Baptist Church. About 200 students are now attending classes under tarps while Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and International Ministries American Baptist Convention USA work to rebuild. These two organizations are already partnering with the Haitian Baptist Convention.  Texas Baptists are joining into this partnership with the Haitian Baptist Convention, CBF and American Baptists on this project.

“The school’s needs are so great,” Shehane said. “Their budgets are in shambles. The other day I was talking with someone at the school and I overheard a teacher telling a little girl that she had to bring 60 gourde, which is $1.54, for her month’s tuition the next day or she couldn’t come back to school. And you know what? I bet she didn’t get it.”

There are at least 160 children on the streets of Grand-Goâve who can’t afford their school tuition.

“Texas Baptists can help with this project,” Shehane said. “We want to provide tuition for one year for as many street kids as possible who can’t afford it. They need backpacks, basic materials, textbooks and uniforms.”  An annual gift of $160 would help a child in Grand-Goâve be able to attend school for one year and receive supplies.

Other construction opportunities for Texas Baptists include rebuilding churches, the third priority Shehane has identified. The Baptist church in Petit-Goâve was completely destroyed. The church in Grand-Goâve is missing a roof and has unsafe walls and a cracked foundation.

“What we’d really love is to find enough Texas Baptist resources to rebuild the churches for them,” Shehane said. “The Grand-Goâve church is the one spearheading the efforts to rebuild their members’ homes. They don’t have any resources left over to repair their own building at this time.”

Thirty-seven miles away in Delmas, Shehane identified three churches that could benefit from Church2Church partnerships. At one church, 125 members were injured, 10 were killed including their pastor, 200 homes were destroyed, 250 were damaged and the church building was severely damaged.

Members of Salem Baptist Church of Delmas also lost their pastor in the earthquake. Sixty church members were wounded or injured, 30 homes were destroyed and 50 homes were damaged.

Martissant Baptist Church in Delmas lost eight members to the earthquake. One hundred and thirty people were wounded or injured, 130 homes were destroyed, 45 were damaged and the church building was damaged. Four children in the congregation were orphaned. Martissant has asked for a Texas Baptist partnership to help rebuild its members’ homes.

Shehane said he hopes partner churches will meet needs where they are able, but also act as networkers on behalf of their Haitian partners.

“The church partners might not meet the need directly, but they can connect with the people who can meet the needs,” Shehane said.

In addition to construction projects, there is a need for nurses, doctors and ophthalmologists to go Haiti in the upcoming months. There is a mobile medical clinic in place on the church grounds in Grand-Goâve staffed by one part-time nurse.

“We would like to plug in some Texas Baptists nurses to go and work for a week at a time,” Shehane said. “We also need general practitioners for neglected people who have never had that type of care.”

“We need ophthalmologists to come to Haiti and give eye exams and do cataract surgery,” Shehane said. “We would love to take 1,000 pairs of glasses on the next trip in all different kinds, all different prescriptions, to match them up with people as best as we can.”

Texas Baptists also are coordinating with Texas Baptist Men in the construction of two wound care clinic—one in Grace Goave and one in Delmas 28, which is part of Port-Au-Prince. These clinics will provide follow-up care for people who were injured in the earthquake and for other on-going health care needs. In addition, the medical professionals who staff the clinics will train some of the local people in proper wound care so this assistance can continue eve after there are no medical staff on site.

“The needs are just so immense,” Shehane said. “How do you decide what to do? You can’t do it all. Even together, we can’t do it all. You just have to take your slice and decide: ‘This is what we’re going to work on. This is where we can help to make a difference.’”

The Baptist General Convention of Texas is coordinating mission trips to the Grand-Goâve area of Haiti, 2.5 hours from Port-au-Prince. Chaplains, counselors, builders, doctors, nurses, eye doctors and any willing hard workers are needed for rebuilding projects and other mission opportunities.

Trip dates are June 26-July 3, July 10-17, Aug. 21-28, Sept. 4-11, Oct. 9-16, and Nov. 13-20. Trip costs are $40 per day, plus airfare, and include meals, water, tents, showers and toilet facilities. The BGCT is offering grants to assist with airfare to Haiti. Contact Marla Bearden at (888) 244-9400 for more information.