Each month we pray for two of our mission partners. During October we are praying for local charity the Hospice of St Francis, and our international focus is JENGA Community Development Outreach.

The Hospice of St Francis

The Hospice of St Francis provides free specialist palliative care, symptom relief and emotional, family and bereavement support for those with serious illness and their loved ones. They provided this support to more than 2,400 people in 2024/5.

They ask us to pray:

• for all their upcoming  fundraising initiatives, that they would be successful in raising much-needed funds and raising community involvement especially in the context of rising costs and decreasing government grants
• for those recently bereaved, that they would know comfort and peace, and
• for  those who offer support and counselling that they would have compassion and wisdom.

JENGA Community Development Outreach

Bex Henderson grew up in Sunnyside Church and during & after university, made regular visits to volunteer with JENGA in the city of Mbale, Eastern Uganda. That was more than a decade ago and before long, Bex settled in Namatala, a sprawling township on the edge of the city and home to some 24,000 people, many of them refugees from the strife-torn areas of northern Uganda. She became the founder of the Loved Children’s Centre (Loved), one of JENGA’s most thriving projects. Sunnyside has been regularly supporting Bex through our Gift Day but over time, we have, as a church and individually, also made donations towards a new Loved building (2020/21) and, in 2022, towards a Community Building, erected on the same site.

Loved is a day centre, caring principally for very young children in the years before they can go to school. Many of the children are from the Namatala slum and are those deemed most at risk of malnutrition and abuse, some of whom have been born with disabilities. They receive early years education, as well as nutritional & medical support. The new Community Building is a place where parents can learn sustainably to care for their children and to acquire new skills which can help provide financial stability for those who’ve previously fallen victim to addiction and poverty.

We pray weekly for Bex and Loved on a Monday morning (and for our other international prayer partners), but for this Prayer Focus, she has sent us these four wider/longer-term prayer points for October:

1. For God to eradicate malnutrition in our district, through the combined efforts of JENGA’s community nutritional health programme and Loved’s life programme. 
2. For a breakthrough from addiction and domestic violence in Namatala and for the specific families we work with, as we have sadly lost two mums this year in violence-related incidents. 
3. For protection, healing and fullness of life over every child that is identified by Loved and that every child would reach their potential (especially those with disabilities). 
4. For a united team who are equipped and empowered to make a change in their community through their work at Loved.