Haiti: Letter from the Presiding Bishop

January 13, 2010     2:03 pm

A letter from the Presiding Bishop

My brothers and sisters in Christ:

We are all praying for those in Haiti who are suffering so deeply from yesterday’s strong earthquake.  I have made a statement to the Church, Episcopal News Service continues to issue news as it becomes available, and Episcopal Relief and Development has already made an initial emergency grant to the Diocese of Haiti.

I am certain that people in your own dioceses are already praying, and will want to know how best to respond.  At present, these are the immediate needs:

1)      prayer, for those who have died, those who are injured, the grieving, the displaced, and all whose lives have been so grievously affected;

2)      financial gifts to Episcopal Relief and Development, marked for Haiti.  These facilitate both the initial emergency response, in ways most needed by the people of Haiti, and eventually, the longer-term recovery response.

Your diocese may have interest in eventually assisting rebuilding efforts.  Recovery and rebuilding will take years.  Episcopal Relief and Development may be involved in rebuilding diocesan health and feeding ministries.  If those are your interests, please contribute directly to ERD, and now.  If your local interest is in rebuilding church buildings or providing funds for diocesan operations, I would encourage you to support such efforts, but for now, please collect and retain any funds and emerging assistance plans within your own diocese.  The Diocese of Haiti will not be ready to respond to that kind of rebuilding help for some time, and when it is, the work will need to be prioritized and directed by Bp Duracin and his staff.

Please strongly discourage any who want to travel to Haiti.  There is little or no ability to receive people, and those who travel there will only burden and endanger people already on the ground.

In the same vein, please ask concerned persons not to try to phone Haiti directly – the lines of communication are almost non-existent, and the lines that do exist are tragically overburdened by those seeking news of relatives.  We will share any and all such information with the larger Church, as that information emerges and is verified.

Pray for those who walk through the valley of the shadow of death, and know that the Lord travels with them.

Katharine