Support for religious sisters in Peru
Support for 26 religious sisters in the Archdiocese of Huancayo in the Andes.
By ACN Staff
Religious sisters in Peru. (Credit: Aid to the Church in Need)
Working in the Archdiocese of Huancayo, high in the Peruvian Andes, are 26 women religious from eight different congregations. Here in this vast region of close to 6000 square miles (15,100 km²) – the size of some small countries – there are no more than around 743,000 people, some 71.5% of whom are Catholics. Consequently, each priest in the diocese has to minister to an average of more than 8000 faithful, scattered over a vast area, moreover.
Religious sisters in Peru. (Credit: Aid to the Church in Need)
The sisters work above all among the people in the rural regions, most of whom live in extreme poverty, barely managing to scrape a living from their livestock and agriculture. The houses they live in are built in the traditional Quincha style of wattle and daub, and in many places, there is not even the most basic infrastructure. And on top of this, the sisters have to cover long distances on unmade roads and tracks, simply in order to reach the faithful.
Nevertheless, Cardinal Pedro Ricardo Barreto Jimeno, the Archbishop of Huancayo, is very pleased with the sisters‘ work and has asked us to support them. He tells us, “There is a lack of vocations. We have fewer and fewer vocations, and consequently fewer priests and religious. Huancayo is a vast territory, and the priests we do have simply cannot cover it all. This situation means that people in the remotest communities, who cannot be reached by the priests, feel dissatisfied and abandoned. Moreover, there are sects in these areas who win over more and more adherents every day and take advantage of the people‘s poverty. Our religious sisters focus their care and their activities on these places, where the priests are not regularly available. They spend two or three days in each community, bringing the people hope and joy, living alongside them and sharing the reality of their lives in order to encourage them and show God‘s word by their living example. The work of the sisters is greatly appreciated, but they do not have the financial resources to cover their own living costs.”
Among other things the sisters prepare children and young people and adults for reception of the sacraments, teach them the faith, support and accompany the families and care for the sick. They stand by these people in all their spiritual, psychological and material needs. So that they can continue this priceless apostolate, we are proposing to help them with basic support for a total value of €10,870. Will you help us?