I trust that you are having a wonderful summer. Thanks to all of you who have responded to our request for up-to-date email addresses.
In this issue of our e-newsletter, Sr. Daphne describes the activities of our Alleppey office and introduces our most hard-working and devoted staff in India.
Warmest regards in Saint Francis
Alan J. Ouimet, S.F.O.
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Dear friends,
With
joined hands I come before you to express my heartfelt gratitude for everything
you, the choicest instruments of Jesus are doing for His poor through this
Apostolate for the past many years.
I have been experiencing your sharing love for the past one year and
appreciate your greatness in providing help to families whom most of you have
not even seen but consider as one of you.
I thank the Franciscan Family Apostolate (FFA USA) for entrusting this
noble work in the hands of Canossian sisters for more than twenty five years
and especially our Bishop Stephen Athipozhiyil who gives us guidance and
suggestions to carry out our work successfully. Also Bishop Peter Chenaparampil, the Bishop Emeritus who has
served the poor of Alleppey always advises us about the importance in
correspondence with the sponsors.
It
is my great pleasure to share with you the daily routine of our office
work. Our day begins at 9.30 a.m.
with the rosary imploring blessings for all our sponsors and their undertakings. We remember all your good intentions
and special requests for our humble prayers. We are happy to note that most sponsors needs are fulfilled
through our fervent prayers, which are revealed through your letters. Mere words cannot express my great
feelings to your understanding love which is showered as blessings upon our
beneficiary families. Through
these years many of them have found answer for their pressing needs, like
finding a proper shelter, buying a little plot of their own, providing education
for their children, meeting their medical needs, settling their daughters,
installing any self help ventures and so on. God has gifted many of you abundantly, for your fruitful
sharing, but there are instances where we also felt pain that why God has
pained some of you even after their generous contribution for their suffering
brothers and sisters. At the same
time according to my own experience, I can say that God has His own great designs
about us for which we have to abide.
Daily many families
come to our office with a request for some help. As Alleppey Diocese is spread out mainly along the coastal
belt, major applications will be from fishing community. Our Diocese is
comprised of six zones. I am
assisted by eight young people to carry out the work of the Apostolate. Each
staff is vested with the responsibility of these six zones. Lilly is in charge of Punnapra region,
Beena is responsible to care for Mt. Carmel Alleppey region, Darley is in
charge of Kattoor region. As
Arthunkal region is scattered to a vast area Aniamma and Karoline are in charge
of this region. Sofia and Soona care for Manakodam and Kandakadavu regions
respectively. Our staff is
visiting their concerned families twice a year and urgent visits are made as
and when updates are required by your requests. Babu, our driver, helps us to reach to the families even in
interior places in time and also takes photographs of families in addition to
the charge of house construction program. The relationship with our beneficiary families are fruitfully maintained
with these personal visits. This
is also a means for monitoring the achievements of our families.All
are equally responsible for the work entrusted and at the same time generously
share in each other's needs. All our staff is equipped with efficiency in
computer handling and also they are provided with two four wheelers and two two-wheelers, so that they can be fast in reaching to the houses of the
beneficiary families. We work as a
team with one mind and heart for the well being of the needy brothers and
sisters as directed and guided by Mr. Alan J. Ouimet S.F.O.
In addition to
house visits each staff member also has office assignments. All our beneficiary families have files
detailing their family background and proper records of assistance received,
correspondences from their sponsors, savings account balances with the bank, fixed
deposits records, proper accounting with annual auditing etc.  The main link
between our sponsors and beneficiary families are the letters sent out and
letters coming in. Usually four
letters are mailed to our sponsors in every year soon after our quarterly aid
distribution. All the families
have to write Malayalam letters detailing their family matters and in some
regions sisters-in-charge translates these letters for them. In addition we have other people who
are doing letter writing for us.
Malayalam letters of each family is given to them and they translate
these letters. On our staff, Beena
is in charge of letter writing and she herself translates letters of certain
regions and checks each letter written by the various letter writers. Please, it is important for you to
receive these letters. If you are not receiving four letters a year let me know
immediately.
Our aid distributions
to families are made at our office itself. All our families have their own savings accounts, which are
maintained in Federal Bank Ltd and South Indian Bank. All the accounts are in the joint name of beneficiary family
and Secretary FFA. Dates are fixed
for each region and informed through parish priest. Our families come according to their allotted dates and
collect cheques according to their needs, which are over checked during our
family visits. Savings accounts
are needed as no cash is ever transacted when we distribute your gift, only
checks are used. We do this to ensure there is a record for every transaction.As I mentioned in
my introductory letter to our sponsors, I also hail from a fisherman family and
could understand their struggles in a deeper way. I feel gifted by our Lord to be in such a position who could
serve the fisher folk whom Jesus loved the most. We pray and try our best that our work may be protected and
guided by the Lord Himself and all of us may be always under the influence of
the Holy Spirit in handling and disbursing the aid. In our
office we have four computers and email facility with chat on Skype. You could expect a fast reply with
photograph from our part for any request regarding your sponsored
families. Our email address is: ffaalleppey@gmail.com and Skype chat address is ffaalleppey. We are always available to serve you
with update reports on your sponsored families.As a reward for
Mr. Alan's great trouble for the uplift of the poor, he succeeded to find many
new sponsors and also few of our old sponsors who had quit Alleppey FFA
rejoined this venture. I would
like to bow my head in front of every noble heart who generously responded to
his plea for helping the needy ones. I ask you to send this appeal to your
friends. We need many, many more sponsors. Word of mouth has always been the
best source for new sponsors - relative and friends. You need only to
refer them to our website, www.openhearts.org, they can pick a family
from there.In addition to providing financial assistance we have to know each family in a
deeper way so that they consider us as one of them and are willing to share even
their family problems with us. This helps them to achieve the self-development benchmarks
set out by us. To move this
process along, there is a need for our staff to increase their skills in
fieldwork and equipping themselves for effective working in the Apostolate. House visits, which
are the most relevant part of our work, could be more qualitatively done
through these special training programs.
Once
again thanking you all for everything
you have done for the Apostolate for the past years and hoping to continue
successfully with all our projects in the coming years. Let us strengthen each other in prayers
and may the Almighty grant wisdom to all of us to take fruitful decisions
during our work in the Apostolate.
In Christ Jesus
Sr. Daphne Anto
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Franciscan Family Apostolate
93 Country Way, Madison, CT 06443
203-458-8172 --ffaindia@att.net
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Franciscan Family Apostolate
Alan Ouimet
Founder and President
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