Joining Hands

Joining Hands by Chenoa Stock, Mission Co-Worker for the PC(USA)

Full disclosure: I was working the slide projector, so I did not take notes, but here is the gist of what Chenoa talked about.

Chenoa detailed her experience in Sri Lanka with the “Joining Hands” mission program. The approach to mission was to work with local groups on issues that they felt were important. The program looks to provide assistance on root causes of poverty and injustice, working with locals of many different faiths.

In Sri Lanka some of the issues that Chenoa’s group worked on were

- helping with long-term recovery from the 2004 tsunami

- dealing with elephant incursions into human-inhabited space. The elephants can be very destructive, destroying property and killing people. But many Sri Lankans also believe that elephants are holy and should not be harmed. Also elephants are valued because of their part in the tourist industry.

- property rights issues

Next year Chenoa will be going to Bolivia, again as part of the Joining Hands network.

You can read more about Joining Hands here:

Read about specifics on the Sri Lankan program

Read about specifics on the Bolivian program.