What is Watoto?

Yesterday we spent most of the day traveling around Uganda to different Watoto sites. When we are working in the babies home it is hard to see the bigger picture so it was nice to see the product of our labor. I had no idea how big of an organization Watoto is here and I learn new things about it everyday. Watoto was started by a missionary couple that felt called to create a place for children to develop into the future leaders of the country. The orphanage that I am working at is called the bulrushes and is located in Kampala city. It has about 36 babies all together. The babies are given to the home by the hospital that finds them neglected, abandoned or abused. Some of the children are found on the side of the road or in dumpsters. Once the children get to be a certain age, they are transferred to a Watoto village that has several housemothers. Each mother can have up to 8 children. The child gets placed with these families and stays with them until they can move out on their own and represent Uganda in a great way. The Watoto model is brilliant. Each village is like a community where the kids can go to school and live with their "families" in a safe environment. The need for safety here is so great because child soldiers are a sad truth of the country. In a town about 5 hours away from here called Gulu, soldiers would come into the villages and take the children for soldiers and the women in order to mutilate and use them for sexual fulfillment. Watoto has also started a branch in Gulu to do reconstructive surgery for the women and provide psychiatry to the brainwashed children. The things that I have seen here are heart breaking but it reminds me how thankful I am and how much of a need there is to be selfless.

I have met several people in Uganda that have literally given up their lives to be here. People who quit their jobs and left their families behind to pursue something greater and it has made me really think about what Francis Chan says in crazy love. That “the world needs Christians who don’t tolerate the complacency of their own lives.” We are all called in one-way or another to spread God’s word. It might not be in such a self-sacrificing way but why is it that we always turn our backs on God?

My plan was to upload pictures but I forgot to bring my camera to the internet cafe so they will hopefully be posted soon.