Newsletter Story | A Rocha in Developing Countries

This year, I experienced two significant moments of gaining a greater appreciation for our work and impact globally.

Every few years, leaders from all the different national A Rocha organizations meet together in a beautiful setting in Europe. This year, five members of A Rocha Canada headed to this gathering called the A Rocha International Forum in the Netherlands. Their report back to A Rocha Canada was memorable and broadened my thinking and feeling about the work we are doing. It was memorable because we were eating a delicious local/organic lunch on the front lawn of A Rocha’s Brooksdale Environmental Centre, amidst 150-foot evergreen trees and acres of gorgeous farm and wetland.

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As a side note, if you have never experienced this lunch, please let me know because you are invited! Secondly, this experience broadened my thinking and feeling because of the way our leaders had been moved by the work in developing countries like Ghana. They reminded us that they are hard pressed to find volunteers because the culture is completely different. Therefore, the staff and volunteers that do show up are quickly welcomed into the A Rocha community. We were also reminded that $1000 goes a lot further in Ghana. This encouraged the board and leadership team to take seriously any donations we are able to legally pass through to our sisters and brothers in Ghana.

The second moment was more like a sequence of moments over the course of Peter Harris’s (Founder of A Rocha) visit to Ontario this fall (Read the A Rocha news story here). Peter has travelled the world while serving A Rocha and caring for God’s world. From this experience and the many years of his work, he shared with us that the reading he gets from the global “Conservation Community” is that they are starting to lose hope. The science is convincing and yet we are still destroying the earth, God’s creation. Does it really take scientists to tell us that fact? Species are being obliterated at an alarming rate—faster than ever before. These are species that we depend on. In what he thinks is the final act of the global “Conservation Community,” Peter claims that our dependency on Earth or being able to measure its worth will not even convince general populations. Why is this?

Peter suggests that it is a question about belief and not thinking. This probably does not surprise you; hopefully I can make an intriguing connection. Our work, as Christians and as connected to the A Rocha community, is to take part in God’s kingdom. What you believe about this kingdom is critically important in informing your behavior in it. Consequently, the work of our developing

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countries, often a place where the collision of belief, poverty and resources lie, should be an example to us.

From the beginning, the A Rocha story has been filled with hope. Finally, I am beginning to see why. These nations help me to remember the importance of our participation in God’s Good work for his kingdom, both in people and places. This is what I am a part of, this is what you are a part of.