SDA Report on Haiti

For days now you and I have followed with broken hearts the tragedy that has unfolded in the nation of Haiti. I have had opportunity to speak to a number of our members here in the Illinois Conference who have personal roots in Haiti. The pain that they are bearing is enormous. One of our sisters, in particular, was in touch with me about her father who was missing. Imagine her joy when she discovered that he was alive. Her brother left Haiti just hours before the earthquake hit. He had been there for a visit.

I have just received a report from the Inter-American Division president, Israel Leito, on his return from a visit to Haiti. This report was sent to Elder Jan Paulsen, the president of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists and Elder Don Schneider, president of the North American Division. The following is a summary of his report.

He thanks the General Conference and the North American Division for the outpouring of support and sympathy shown to the members in Haiti. The strongest conference in the the Haitian Union was the hardest hit. Next Monday they will be trying to make payroll to the church employees but it is challenging in the face of the total destruction of the banking system. The Inter-American Division has decided to help the workers with a stipend until the situation normalizes.

The Dominican Union (the other half of the island of Hispaniola) is also stepping up with resources and personnel to help the members in Haiti. The Puerto Rican Union is shipping vanloads of relief materials to Haiti via a ferry that runs between Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic.

Here are some of the details of the destruction. 115 churches have been totally destroyed. 60 others have sustained significant damage and will not be used until fully inspected for safety. Five schools have been totally destroyed and 60 others have sustained serious damage. Here are Pastor Leito’s descriptive words: “If you have seen the piece on Fox News, the church mentioned in that piece is the church just across the presidents palace, where the school we thought so many children perished is located. In that school, only the watchman died, he was taking a bath at the time of the quake, and could not leave the building. When the church collapsed, the children ran outside to see what was happening, and at that moment the school collapsed.  Fourteen bodies were recovered from another large church, where two different church choirs were rehearsing at the time of the quake. What took so many years to build as church infrastructure has been laid to waste in matter of a few seconds.”

At this point it has been verified that nearly 600 members have died in the quake. Another 600 have had serious injuries with many resulting in amputations of limbs. 15,000 of our Adventist brothers and sisters have lost their homes. 27,000 of them are in refugee centers. While several pastors were injured and some lost everything they owned, their lives have been spared.

“The university has lost the roof of the Girls dorm and has suffered damage to other buildings. Most of the industry section of the university has been greatly damaged, thus causing other means of income for the university to be gone.”

ADRA (Adventist Disaster and Relief Agency) is very active in Haiti and is on the ground in a big way, managing refugee centers, materials and playing a big role in assisting our Adventist Hospital in Haiti as they, like so many other medical institutions there, are overrun with the injured. Many of our Adventist medical institutions in the U.S. are mobilizing to join the efforts to treat the vast number of injured.

Pastor Leito’s final words in the report are these: “On behalf of the church in Haiti, I want to thank you for your support, any little bit helps.”

Right now the best thing we here can do is pray and give financially to support ADRA and the many other relief agencies that are on the ground in Haiti. I have had many members express their desire to volunteer. There will come a time in the coming months and years when the church there will be rebuilding their churches, schools and other institutions but that will have to wait. Right now is the time to save lives and support the people in Haiti in their efforts to return to some level of normalcy. So, just give.  You can do that online at www.adra.org. I am also attaching a bullet list of information directly from ADRA. Many of you will want to address this need in church tomorrow. We are not taking a specific offering at this point because by directing you to ADRA the money can get there so much faster than being collected in the churches and then sent through the conference.  Please consider making a generous gift to help the people of Haiti.

God’s blessings on you as you worship Him this Sabbath.

Sincerely,
Ken Denslow, President
Illinois Conference of Seventh-day Adventists