Carelink Winter Heating Appeal, 2008
In previous Winters for several years now, Carelinks initiated a major project to try to meet the significant problem of suffering as a result of the low temperatures in Eastern Europe. We provided funds to pay for heating bills, improved houses against the cold, installed internal toilets, delivered firewood, warm clothing, medical and other assistance to around 50 of the most needy brothers and sisters. As reported in our updates, we believe this significantly alleviated the suffering of several families, single mothers and especially elderly brothers and sisters. Given rising fuel prices the average cost of heating an apartment is almost the entire old age pension for sisters. Those with no supporting relatives, living alone, are left with literally nothing to survive on over the Winter months. Please consider sponsoring or contributing to a brother or sister in need this year. WE’RE SEEKING TO RAISE AROUND 6,000 G.B.P. (US$12,000, AU$14,000), TO BE DISTRIBUTED THIS WINTER TO BROTHERS AND SISTERS IN NEED. Some of them and their situations are explained below- as you can see, we’ve now had a few years experience of assisting some of these cases, and we believe this truly is a work God is blessing. Please help us continue it this Winter.
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Sister Tanya
Sister Tanya [in the photo, wrapped in blanket] is a very faithful sister who has led others to the way of life. She suffers with her health and has a very small pension; the heating bills in Winter are about the same as her pension, which leaves her in a really difficult position so far as food, clothing and medicines are concerned. She tries to make her own medicines as she can't afford to buy them in Winter, like grinding up eggshells to make calcium. We would like to make some contribution to her Winter heating this year. Last year she was most appreciative of the hot water bottles. |
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Sister Zina
Sister Zina lives in a small town, alone in her 80s. She is very shaky on her feet but has to walk 1 km. each way to the shop and even further to get her pension. She needs help with paying for heating over the Winter.
Sister Dzidra
Invalid sister Dzidra lives alone most of the time and is cared for by another sister, who you can see breaking bread with her in the photo. Her pension simply isn't enough to cover the cost of Winter heating.
Sister Evgeniya
Elderly sister Evgeniya lives alone with her goats (which she has indoors with her over the Winter). She collects water in buckets which she places at the edge of her tin roof [see photo]. But temperatures got so low and firewood so expensive in previous years that she didn't have enough heat in the house to melt the snow on the roof. She needs help with firewood and Winter repairs to her home.
Sister Galina
Sister Galina is a very faithful sister whose husband has died and so she is left alone to meet the Winter heating bills. Her heating bills are about the same as her monthly pension, leaving her with nothing to live off at all. We need to help her with the bills over Winter. [Photo: Galina with her late husband Br Leonid soon after their baptism some years ago.]
Sister Ludmila
Sister Ludmila is great in spirit but physically very small, she has never been married, and is now elderly and living alone in a small house on the edge of a village, far from even the next house. She is sometimes attacked by local muslim neighbours who break her windows and steal the bucket and chain on her well. She needs firewood and continual home repairs.
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Sister Nina
We reported earlier on Sister Nina's tragic loss of her farm buildings which were burnt to the ground, including the loss of all her animals. Since then we've helped her rebuild a little. However, she needs support this Winter with buying medicines, firewood and some meat as she only has potatoes and some preserved vegetables to eat over the Winter. |
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Sister Sofia
Faithful Sister Sofia lives in a tumbledown home. Four of her distant relatives have been baptized thanks to her preaching. She is now very weak physically, walking with difficulty with a stick, and there are many heating improvements that need doing to enable her to live reasonably over this coming Winter. She also needs help with medicines. |
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Sister Lena
Lena has been baptized many years, her mother Sis. Klaudia fell asleep a few years ago. Lena lives with her violently alcoholic brother in a very broken down home, has major health issues. She’s a Russian living in Moslem Kazakhstan, and as such faces much discrimination. She has to pay for all health care. She faithfully reads the Bible every day and does her best to survive in a very abusive situation.
Sister Galina
Galina lives in little more than a shack, intended as temporary accommodation on an allotment of land intended as a garden. She spends much of her time on her back, has sight problems, and a tiny pension. There are no shops or work nearby. Raised an orphan, she has no family to support her. We were able to help her last year fix up some of her windows. She had placed asbestos and tin sheet against the windows, as the glass had long fallen out. Galina lives in a part of Russia where temperatures are often -20 in Winter.
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Brother Vladimir & Sister Marita Vladimir and Marita are both deaf, as are their two children. They live in an isolated area and walk and otherwise travel a long way to work in a fish factory, where they are often deceived of their wages because of their disability and inability to communicate. It’s hard for them to provide for the needs of the children with very little income, and Winter is an especially hard time for them due to extra fuel and transport costs. They are exemplary believers, Vladimir was baptized in 1992 and we have been deeply impressed and encouraged by his faith ever since. You can see him with hot water bottle and blanket from previous years’ assistance. |
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Brother Dmitry
Dima suffered an accident which left him paralyzed and unable to move apart from his arms. He lives with his elderly mother and is able to read, which means he reads the Bible and our literature all the time. But he needs to keep warm, and sits in front of an electric heater most of the Winter (you can see it in the photo, with his Bible on it). They live in a rural area in Russia and his mother grows what food she can for them. He needs help for the electric bills, for buying in firewood, and if possible to make some improvements to the water and toilet system to make the Winter more bearable.
Brother Valerij + Brother Sasha
These two brothers in the flesh are victims of Chernobyl radiation, and are both effectively wheelchair bound. They live in a small village and are cared for by their mother, with no other relatives. Their bones are decaying and they can do very little to help themselves. We provided wheelchairs for them but they need basic assistance with firewood, electric bills, medicines over the Winter period, and insulation of the walls to keep out the damp that triggers many of their health issues.
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Brother Anvar
Anvar is a Russian living in an area of Kyrgyzstan from which most Russians have now emigrated. He lives alone amongst Moslems, and finds it hard to get work beyond part time and often temporary cleaning work. He has a phenomenal Bible knowledge and preaches fearlessly. We provided him previously with a warm jacket and blankets, for which he is still so deeply grateful; but he needs regular support to pay the heating bills over the Winter. |
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Sister Sarmite
Sarmite is one of our very isolated subsistence farmers, even making things from the skins of the animals which her and her husband hunt. You can see her in the photo with one of these, and also being given a coat on a previous occasion. Over the Winter they live off what they have stored from the Summer, but as their age and health issues advance it’s increasingly hard for them to survive the Winters. But as Brother David Webb observed after visiting her, “She’s in love with the Truth”. They need assistance with firewood, insulating their decaying home, which is literally alone in a forest, and in meeting electricity bills. |
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Ieva, Sis. Anita & Bro. Laimonis
Ieva has thyroid problems and over Winter she and her two young children (also ill with thyroid deficiencies) live with her parents (both in the Truth) in a village, where they have permission to live in the cellar of the local school when it gets very cold- her father is the caretaker of the school. The cellar is warm because it’s where the boilers are, but it’s very dark and unpleasant there. We’d like to provide support so that they can get their home warmer and keep it warm, so that they don’t have to resort to this desperate measure. Here’s Br Laimonis with a warm coat we previously gave him. |
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Sister Evgenija
Evgenija is an invalid, needing two crutches to walk, and lives on the fourth floor of a five floor block which has no lift. She’s very scared to go out in Winter for fear of slipping. So she’s needs to pay for deliveries of things to her, and also meet the heating bills which are nearly as high as her pension; plus she needs medications and to actually eat something over the Winter.
Please pray for these and other brothers and sisters, and if possible please contribute to the Winter Appeal!
Here’s how you can donate:
- Send a cheque made out to “Carelinks” to:
AUSTRALIA & NEW ZEALAND: Carelinks, FAO John Thatcher. P.O. Box 152, MENAI CENTRAL, NSW 2234 Australia
CANADA: Steve and Connie Keating, 3420 Lakeshore Road, R.R.3, Alexandria, ON K0C 1A0 Canada
EUROPE: Sonia Hemingray, 40 Rue de la Baisse, F-69100, VILLEURBANNE, FRANCE
UNITED KINGDOM: Robin & Jean Field, 4 Ellergreen, Burneside, Kendal LA9 5SD U.K.
U.S.A.: Carelinks USA, c/o Charlie Klennert, PO Box 1049, Sumner, WA 98390 U.S.A.
ELSEWHERE: Carelinks, FAO John Thatcher. P.O. Box 152, MENAI CENTRAL, NSW 2234 Australia
For more information, details of tax efficient giving or comments please contact a Carelinks volunteer or email us at info@carelinks.net – These brothers and sisters really do appreciate any assistance we can give them! If you would like to donate to any of the particular cases mentioned above, please let us know and we’ll ensure this is done and provide feedback.
Photos: Old women selling their clothes to pay Winter bills; assisting a brother with TB in his damp and collapsing home; old sister with two sticks walking on ice; Carelinks vehicle delivering aid; vitamins; firewood and clothes delivery; the urban poor ice fishing to supplement diet.