Killyleagh minister at Christian Aid projects in Sierra Leone

Killyleagh minister at Christian Aid projects in Sierra Leone

26 February 2020

A LOCAL Church of Ireland minister has returned home from a fact-finding trip to west Africa. 

The Rev Colin Darling, rector of St John’s Parish Church in Killyleagh, spent nine days visiting Christian Aid community projects in Sierra Leone last month. 

Mr Darling, whose grandfather, Dean Stanley Mann, was rector of the same parish from 1935 until 1963, said he was “deeply impressed” by what was being achieved by Christian Aid for families who live outside the capital city of Freetown. 

He said: “Sierra Leone has a population of around eight million people, of which half live in the capital. However, for the other half who live in small rural villages life is very tough.” 

“While the country has great natural resources in so far as it has gold and diamond mines – wealth is unfairly distributed. 

“The rest of the country suffers from poor infrastructure, no electricity and little in the way of health care. It is like the way Ireland was in the 1850s.” 

Mr Darling said a woman in Sierra Leone is 170 times more likely to die during child birth than a woman in the UK. 

He said: “In the UK there are estimated to be eight women in every 100,000 who die giving birth. In Sierra Leone the number rises to 1,350. Women shouldn’t have to die just because they are pregnant. 

“Their government know the needs of the people. They just don’t have the capacity to supply them or solve their problems. We have to teach them so they can help themselves, empower women and become stronger economically. 

“However, there is much they can teach us about society too. While I was there, I never felt threatened. Their communities are relatively safe places. 

“In a country where three-quarters are Muslim and just under one quarter are Christian, they manage to get on very well together and even visit each other’s homes regularly.”

The country is recovering from a very bloody war which ended in 2002 and also struggling to cope from the Ebola Virus which claimed thousands of lives and still threatens many more. 

Mr Darling was in Sierra Leone as a representative of the Church of Ireland’s Bishops’ Appeal.

“Nobody realises the impact that funding such as ours can have on an impoverished society,” he remarked. 

“People think that when they put £5 into a little Christian Aid envelope that’s the end of it. It’s certainly not. 

“Many projects such as the market garden which Christan Aid helped create can have an enormous impact. Local women can grow extra produce to take to the market and sell which helps small subsistence farmers.

“We teach women how to run their own credit union or help local land owners. Sometimes, many of these land owners have been duped by big multi-national investors to part with their land for a mobile phone. 

“They need to be able to access free legal advice so they can be aware of the pitfalls. The needs of the people in Sierra Leone run deep. It is hard to comprehend as we tend to take everything we have for granted in our part of the world.”

Mr Darling added: “Christian Aid can deliver. They invited me to help decide on more projects for the next three to four years and also see if the money they have already spent is being put to the best use. 

“I was only too delighted to be invited along on this trip as their guest and I hope to be part of this initiative for as long as I’m needed.”