In the summer of 2022, our beloved trustee and chairman of Lily for the Congo, Ray Pitman, embarked on his own personal journey over to DR Congo to meet the children who are in our community over there. He paid for the trip himself and went with members of the Congo Children Trust https://www.congochildrentrust.org/ who were visiting the area. Luckily the Congo Children Trust and Lily have similar aims and objectives in helping the children in the DR Congo and we are grateful to them for helping and guiding us as a charity.
Ray spent two weeks in Congo, meeting Brother Issac who is our pastor and founder member of Lily and spending time in his church and surrounding area. Ray greatly enjoyed his time there, and sent lots of photos and details of the children and life in the Congo. Our intention when Ray returned was to put all the photos together and present a little talk to our supporter about the children and the challenges they face, however not long after Ray got back to the UK he started to feel unwell and a few months later he got the devastating news that he had cancer. Unfortunately Ray passed away in April 2023, leaving us all shocked and saddened.
In tribute to Ray we wanted to present some of the photos and tell the stories that he came back with, about life in the Congo.
Ray and Brother Issac got along very well, and Brother Issac considered Ray to be like a real brother to him. Ray got to meet Issac's grown up children and spend time with his family.
One of the things that Ray commented on was the traffic and the lack of any apparent rules of the road! Ray was adamant he was not getting on a motorbike, until Brother Issac pointed out that the roads were so bad that if he wanted to go anywhere off the main track it would have to be by bike!
As a charity we used to send gifts to the children each Christmas, until they stopped reaching the community. Ray found out the reason why… there is no postal service in that area of Congo now, no postal workers to deliver the letters!
One of the highlights of the trip was sourcing a football to arrange a game between the local children.
Whilst there we sent funding to run an art competition for the children in our community and Ray found a local artist to run the session, something which the children greatly enjoyed.
He also met some of the children who are not as lucky as our children in the Lily community. There are thought to be 250,000 children living on the streets in DR Congo, some as young as 5 years old. Our child sponsorship programme keeps children in homes and prevents the children who have lost both parents from becoming another ‘rescue child’, the heart-breaking term for street children.
Child Sponsorship
The children who are sponsored by Lily for the Congo go to school and receive an education, which gives them the best start in life. They are given food and housing and we help when they get sick. We can’t do this without sponsors who send a regular donation to support these vulnerable children. If you and your family would like to learn more about sponsoring a child please reach out for more information. The cost is £25 or £30 per child and every penny of that goes directly to the children who need it.
Ray was never more happy than when a new sponsor came forward and decided to make a difference to a child who needed help, and it would be a fantastic tribute to him if we could provide all our children with the education and love they deserve. To
find out more about sponsoring a child please get in touch at info@lilyforthecongo.org
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