Four Mopeds for Pastoral and Social Work in India

Many of the 1,150 villages of the Diocese of Eluru in southeast India where Catholic faithful live are accessible only via narrow, unpaved tracks, but with your help, religious now have four mopeds. Without bicycles or mopeds, priests and catechists would have to spend hours on foot, walking from one village to another. A moped or a bicycle is an ideal way of saving time and energy and providing a more intensive ministry for the people.

The faithful need this pastoral support. Many have not been Christians very long; they need intensive support and accompaniment if the faith is to put down deep roots within them and enable them to grow into the life of the Church. They also need a great deal of help in the needs of their everyday lives. There is deep poverty in the region; most people work as day laborers and live from hand to mouth.

Even the children have to work in the fields of the big landowners, herding the cattle of the rich or running themselves ragged as message bearers. Most cannot even think of attending school. Entire families live in tiny grass huts, without running water or any modern conveniences. On average, these families have to live on half a dollar a day, and sometimes they are cheated even of these paltry wages, so that the whole family has to go to bed on an empty stomach.

Thanks to the $3,700 donating by our benefactors, these mopeds will allow priests and catechists to more easily reach these villages and bring the people the help they need.

Bishop Jaya Rao Polimera extends his heartfelt thanks to all our benefactors and promises his prayers for all who have helped!

Aid to the Church in Need commits to invest your funds where they will have the greatest impact for the Church that we serve. Funds donated to Aid to the Church in Need’s projects will be used towards the greatest need in our programs to help keep the Faith alive.

Code: 317-08-29