You’ve seen the news and read the stories of the terrible war and devastation in the DRC. Now it’s time to make a difference. This Valentine’s Day, February 15th, join us in San Francisco in solidarity with Congolese women to inspire hope and improve lives.

Join us for a memorable night! Feb. 15th, 2012 7-10pm or whenever you stop dancing! DOSA Restaurant on Fillmore, San Francisco Tickets are $150 for dinner, wine, music and photography  We hope to see you there! Click here to view the full invitation. We hope to see you there!

We’re now halfway through the month of December and have raised $4,300 of our $10,000 December goal.  Thank you to those who have already donated! We appreciate your generosity and support and encourage you to help us spread the word!

Our plan is to raise $10,000 through our $20 in December giving campaign.  100% of the money raised will go directly to our partners in the Democratic Republic of Congo to fund safe houses for victims of sexual violence and to provide job training and microloans for the residents.

With your donations, women in the Congo will learn a valuable skill, create a small business, and be able to support themselves and their children. It really works.

Almost a year ago in one of our sponsored safe houses, women received sewing training to promote self-sufficiency and establish community. Today, they are sewing uniforms for the local hospital, and all of their children are in school. This is just one of many examples of CTA helping women take back control of their lives and livelihoods.

Please help us empower more women in terrible situations to do the same. This holiday season, give the gift of self determination. Help these women help themselves, their families, and their communities.

Thank you from the Care Through Action team, and happy holidays!

Remember:
$20 we can keep a safe house open for a day
$60 we can pay a counselor’s salary for a month
$80 we can provide 1 woman a 6-month sewing training
$110 we can provide a loan and teach how to manage it
$360 we can teach 30 women to bake & sell bread

Our Challenge:  Everyone donate just $20 in December 2011 and have a friend to do the same

Our Goal:
• Provide equipment and rotating credit funds for small business projects (sewing, bread making, basket-weaving) in 25 safe houses
• Provide small business and leadership training in each of the 31 safe houses to help them become self-sustaining within 3-5 years.
• Sustain the current facilities in eastern Congo

This holiday season give a gift of hope…

Give just $20 this December to help change a woman’s life in the Congo

Read about us in the Huffington Post
“Charities that stretch your dollar most”

$20 will keep a safe house open for a day
$60 pays a counselor’s salary for a month
$80 provides 1 woman a 6-month sewing training
$110 gives a micro-loan & teaches her how to manage it
$360 teaches 30 women how to bake & sell bread

This December, help a woman in the DRC like Evangeline change her life…

At 16 years old, Evangeline was  kidnapped by a group of FDLR militia and kept as a sex slave for over two months in the forest.  When she tried to escape, she was shot in the leg and returned to captivity with no medical care.

Her leg became quickly infected.  As gangrene set in, she was sure she would die.  Then one of the soldiers took pity on her and drove her in the dark of night to a village, leaving her there in hopes that someone would find her before she succumbed to infection. The villagers who found her got her to a hospital where her leg had to be amputated at the hip.

Evangeline arrived at the Care Through Action safe house in Nyamilima a broken spirit.  “I was so sad. I didn’t want to live anymore,” she says, “but the women of the house helped me.”  She was greeted by a group of women who had survived similar attacks, and supported her during her recovery. While learning to walk on a prothetic leg, Evangeline also learned how to sew, and with a micro-loan, she started her own sewing business.

Evangeline now walks confidently with a smile and helps new women who come to the house.  With the emotional, physical and financial support of Care Through Action and her new-found sisters at Nyamilima, Evangeline is rebuilding her life.

This is what we do, these are the stories of hope that keep all of us at Care Through Action going, and we need your help.

This December, please donate just $20 to help support our efforts in bringing hope to the women of the Congo.

The Challenge:  Everyone donate just $20 in December 2011 and have a friend to do the same

The Goal:
• Provide equipment and rotating credit funds for small business projects (sewing, bread making, basket-weaving) in 25 safe houses
• Provide small business and leadership training in each of the 31 safe houses to help them become self-sustaining within 3-5 years.
• Sustain the current facilities in eastern Congo

Our target of $10,000 won’t accomplish all of these goals in their entirety, but it will be a significant and meaningful start.  If donations are secured from our strong existing following and from new supporters found by you, we have the potential to far exceed this fundraising goal.  As always, 100% of the funds raised will go directly to CTA’s partners in the DRC to build and equip safe house and provide microloans.

This holiday season give a gift of hope…

Visit www.carethroughaction.org anytime to make a donation or purchase Alissa’s award winning photography of the DRC. 100 percent of the proceeds go directly to help women in the DRC rebuild their lives. A donation of just $10 will provide HIV testing for 5 victims of violence.

Our executive director Alissa Everett recently returned from another trip to the Democratic Republic of Congo. While in the DRC, security restrictions kept Alissa from visiting the Care Through Action sponsored safe houses, but the head of the Wamama Simameni safe house project, Modestine, has provided a report detailing their progress.

Over the last year, Wamama Simameni, in partnership with CTA, built a safe house, organized the training of two successive groups of women in baking, soap making, embroidery and other vocational skills, trained 60 women in the management of small shops, and conducted interviews with local leaders on human rights issues.

Modestine reported that the sexual violence in the North Kivu region, where the CTA sponsored safe houses operate, continues to escalate with men being regularly targeted as well as women. It is clear that our steadfast support is needed as innocent citizens of the DRC continue to be violently victimized.

Some exciting news: our partner HEAL Africa was one of three recipients of the $1 million 2011 Opus Prize for its work building safe houses in the DRC. The founder of HEAL
Africa, Lyn Lusi, came to meet with our board in San Francisco. It was an amazing experience to speak with a woman who has devoted her life to helping those in need, and CTA thanks her for her tireless, impactful efforts to right some of the terrible inequities plaguing the DRC.

Visit CTA’s website to see how else your donations can help.  CTA also now offers the option of monthly recurring donations and corporate matching.

Thank you for your continued support of all our efforts!

Lyn Lusi, co-founder and director of HEAL, was honored for her work in the DRC.

“She came to the Congo (formerly Zaire) from England in 1971 as a teacher with the Baptist Missionary Society. In 1974, she fell in love and married a Congolese physician, Dr. Kasereka M. “Jo” Lusi, and worked in school and hospital administration in Congo for the next 19 years.  After earning her master’s degree in Human Resource Development and Training, Lyn and Dr. Jo founded HEAL Africa, bringing her formidable administrative, program and people skills to the survivors of violence and rape in the DRC.  In 2002, when a volcano destroyed the original hospital, the couple rebuilt HEAL Africa’s medical facility one wing at a time.

HEAL Africa medical staff provide maternal care, treat individuals with HIV/AIDS, specialize in orthopedic surgery for children with club feet, but are probably best known for fistula repair for women.  The hospital also trains doctors and nurses in various specialties.  The hospital is one of only three referral hospitals in all of Congo, and comprises 20 percent of the work of HEAL Africa; 80 percent of the organization’s efforts are focused in communities throughout the North Kivu and Maniema provinces.”

http://www.opusprize.org/winners/11_Lusi.cfm

http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/24/living/dream-careers-o/index.html

While working in the DRC, Care Through Action discovered that not only were women of Eastern Congo being subjected to violence, but also, that they are isolated and disempowered in their communities.  In response, we founded Voix de la Paix, or “Voices of Peace,” a collaboration between Care Through Action and Abigail Disney’s Peace is Loud Foundation, run by our founder, Alissa Everett.

Voix de la Paix focuses on using Abby’s film, Pray the Devil Back to Hell, about a women’s movement that helped end the civil war in Liberia, in peace-building in the Democratic Republic of Congo.   Through screenings and workshops, Voix de la Paix is encouraging thoughtful discussions on activism and peace-building across the DRC among community leaders, law enforcement, activists, politicians and victims of sexual violence.

PRAY has been screened several times in 2010 and 2011 in Kinshasa, Goma and Bukavu, in both French and Swahili, provoking compelling discussions on the role of women in the Congolese community, the origins of sexual violence, the potential role of women in peace-building, and the role of men as partners to women in peace.

One specific screening to in March 2010 to university students at the Université Protestante du Congo (UPC) in Kinshasa incited reactions such as:

“Since I was a child, I used to say that women were more powerful than men.  Most of people never believed me, but now I have confirmed that it is true.”

– A female university student in Kinshasa

“I didn’t understand that women could fight for peace.  It’s a big surprise to me.”

“The thing that is really important is that women themselves are the power.  These women were not in government… they were nothing.”

“Before this movie I didn’t think women could do anything.  And now I know they can do something.”

– Male university students in Kinshasa

Read the entire  O article here.