Stories tagged with: haiti

• Haiti judge frees 1 Baptist volunteer

  by Staff, posted Monday, March 08, 2010 (14 years ago)

  PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (BP)--A Haiti judge freed one of two remaining Baptist volunteers Monday but kept the group's leader in jail pending further investigation. Read More

• Groups hope to send 150,000 'food buckets' to Haiti

  by Mickey Noah, posted Friday, February 26, 2010 (14 years ago)

  ALPHARETTA, Ga. (BP)--Organizers of the "Buckets of Hope" initiative for Haiti relief estimate that 150,000 food buckets will be shipped to Port-au-Prince to help combat hunger in the earthquake-devastated country.

  

        Several Baptist state conventions have announced a goal for the number of buckets their state's church members will contribute including Kentucky with 10,000 buckets; Tennessee with 7,000 buckets; the Southern Baptist Conservatives of Virginia with 6,000 buckets; Louisiana, Georgia and South Carolina with 5,000 buckets each; Arkansas with 4,000; and New Mexico with 2,100. Read More

• 40,000 Haitians profess faith in Christ since Jan. 12 quake

  by Barbara Denman, posted Thursday, February 25, 2010 (14 years ago)

  PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (BP)--A reported 40,127 Haitians have made professions of faith in Jesus Christ since a major earthquake hit the impoverished nation in January, according to pastors and directors of missions within the Confraternite Missionaire Baptiste d'Haiti (CMBH).

        "Haiti is ripe for a spiritual movement from God," said Craig Culbreth, director of the Florida Baptist Convention's partnership missions department, which coordinates the work of the CMBH, upon his Feb. 22 return from Port-au-Prince.

        During a Feb. 16-17 citywide holiday observance in Cap Haitien, Haiti's second largest city, Culbreth saw "thousands upon thousands filling the streets where people are seeking God and asking Him to spare them from what happened in Port-au-Prince. For me, it was a New Testament expression of what it looks like when the Spirit of God shows up. I have never seen anything like it."

        The CMBH is the Florida Baptist Convention-funded partnership of nearly 900 Haitian Baptist churches throughout Haiti. Through the partnership the Florida convention employs seven indigenous missionaries in six regions. Read More

• 2 Baptists in Haiti won't be freed this week

  by Staff, posted Thursday, February 25, 2010 (14 years ago)

  PORT-AU-PRINCE (BP)--The Haiti judge overseeing the case of two jailed Baptist volunteers said Thursday the women won't be released this week and that he wants to obtain more testimony from others. Read More

• Remaining 2 Baptist volunteers in Haiti to be freed

  by Staff, posted Wednesday, February 24, 2010 (14 years ago)

  PORT-AU-PRINCE (BP)--The two Baptist volunteers still in jail in Haiti will be freed and possibly could be released this week, the judge overseeing the case says.

        "We haven't found anything that could suggest wrongdoing on the part of the Americans," Judge Bernard Saint-Vil told Reuters Tuesday.

        "I think they could be released this week," he added.

        Laura Silsby and Charisa Coulter, members of Central Valley Baptist Church in Meridian, Idaho, have been in jail since Jan. 29, when they and eight of their team members were arrested on charges of child kidnapping and criminal association when they tried to take 33 children out of the earthquake-ravaged country and to a makeshift orphanage in the Dominican Republic. They allegedly did not have the proper paperwork. Read More

• Volunteers carry compassion to Haiti, but have 'no bottled answers'

  by Staff, posted Wednesday, February 24, 2010 (14 years ago)

  PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (BP)--"What do I do?" the Haitian man asked helplessly. Having lost his wife and two children and his home in Haiti's Jan. 12 earthquake, he was living out of a suitcase.

  Butch Vernon struggled to answer the man's question.

  "I'm not asked that question a lot back in the States, you know?" the Baptist pastor said, his voice cracking with emotion.

  Vernon, who was in Haiti as a volunteer with a Kentucky Baptist disaster relief team, later reflected, "It's not on... Read More

• Volunteers from 16 states in Haiti so far

  by Mickey Noah, posted Wednesday, February 24, 2010 (14 years ago)

  PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (BP)--Yet another aftershock rattled Haiti in the early morning hours of Feb. 22, six weeks after the initial 7.0 earthquake devastated the Caribbean country.

  "The Lord provided us all with an early morning wakeup call -- a bed-shaking, chandelier-swinging, earth-rumbling aftershock that sent volunteers out of the Florida guesthouse," Kentucky Baptist disaster relief leader Tom Westerfield reported from Port-au-Prince where he is serving on the Southern Baptist Disaste... Read More

• Former Haiti detainee calls story about note 'fabrication'

  by Mark Kelly, posted Monday, February 22, 2010 (14 years ago)

  NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)--A national media report claiming American missions volunteers in a Haitian jail feared for their lives and had been lied to by their team leader was "a complete fabrication," one of those volunteers told Oprah Winfrey Feb. 19.

        NBC reported Feb. 6 that one of the jailed volunteers slipped a note through the bars of their cell that said in part: "We fear for our lives in Haiti. There is corruption and extortion. Laura wants to control. We believe lying. We're afraid."

        The note purportedly added: "Please, you must listen. We have no way to call. Court will not let us have a say with anything about truth for us. We only came as volunteers. We had nothing to do with any documents and have been lied to."

        The report was "a complete fabrication," Allen told Winfrey's television audience via satellite from his home in Texas. "I don't know anything about that at all. I know what went on with the five men because we were together. The women were separated. Us five men had no ill feelings toward anybody." Read More

• Extending compassion to Haiti from the USS Normandy

  by Adam R. Cole, posted Friday, February 19, 2010 (14 years ago)

  NORFOLK, Va. (BP)--Their situation, one that is lacking any sort of opportunity in a world full of wealth and prosperity, will stick with me. The kids, so full of joy even though they have nothing, will stick with me as well.

  

  Photo by Navy Ensign Adam R. Cole

        A drop of clean water, a balanced meal -- luxuries for these people -- will never be taken for granted again.

        I didn't expect to be sent to Haiti to help those in need -- not like this, not on a U.S. Navy warship whose primarily mission is air defense. Yet God has the bigger plans, always, in my individual life and in humanity as a whole.

  

  Photo by Navy Ensign Adam R. Cole

        The 7.0-magnitude that shook Haiti on Jan. 12 crumbled just about everything in and around the capital of Port-au-Prince. International relief workers rushed to the scene and so did military contingencies from a number of countries. My ship, the USS Normandy, was sent with an aircraft carrier, a handful of Marine-carrying amphibious ships and a hospital ship.

        I watched the news intently once we got orders to become part of Operation Unified Response in Haiti. Lifting the plight of the hurting to the Lord is something I try to do regardless of how connected I am to a particular tragedy or situation of struggle. With Haiti, I found myself woven more deeply into the process of intercession than ever before. Read More

• 2 detainees appear before judge in Haiti

  by Staff, posted Friday, February 19, 2010 (14 years ago)

  PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (BP)--As enthusiastic friends and family in the United States welcomed home eight missions volunteers jailed in Haiti since Jan. 29, two other members of their team appeared Thursday before a judge in Haiti. Read More