MDG’s – Holy Cross Episcopal Church

For the past two years, Holy Cross has sent an amount equal to 0.7% of its income to support two aid and development projects in Africa.

KWIHEED supports microentrepreneurs like this woman, selling produce in the marketplace.

The first is WINHEEDCAM, formerly known as KWIHEED, a microcredit development agency operating in Cameroon. It was founded by Concord doctor Munro Proctor, who found in the course of medical mission work that economic development was the foundational need of rural people in Cameroon. With Dr. Proctor’s retirement, his work has been taken over by an organization called endPoverty.org, which is a funding and oversight operation for a dozen or more locally based development projects in Africa, Asia, Eastern EuropeÂ and Latin America. The transfer will enable the continuation and expansion of the wonderful work WINHEEDCAM has done over the years.

The second project we support is Masiphumele Corporation. Masiphumele operates in one of the poor townships outside of Capetown, South Africa. It provides leadership, organizational skills, training,Â and other support to community leaders engaged in home building, education, and other community activities. Like KWIHEED, Masiphumele has New Hampshire connections. It is the child of a Granite State couple who also have a home in South Africa.

Both the national Episcopal Church and the Diocese of New Hampshire have endorsed the Millennium Development Goals of the United Nations, which call for devoting 0.7% of budgets at every level of society in developed countries to help the developing nations of the world attain educational, health and social goals by 2015.

Holy Cross commits 0.7% of its income to organizations that work abroad to realize the Millennium Development Goals adopted by the United Nations and endorsed by the Episcopal Church.

Bishop Arthur Walmsley, a member of Holy Cross, recently spoke about the connection between the Gospel and the MDG’s.

Excerpts from an address at Trinity Church, Concord, MA, on February 22, 2009.

The vision of the Millennium Development Goals is not new. For people who draw their faith from the Bible, it is as old as scripture. There is a Biblical mandate to serve Godâ€™s mission … and scripture offers us an understanding of the global crisis which has the potential to move us beyond the paralysis of the present to an affirmation and a way of being grounded in hope.

The doorway to this understanding starts with Jesus.