FORGOTTEN VOICES INTERNATIONAL

To heal from trauma, Forgotten Voices provides trauma-informed counseling to orphaned and vulnerable children as well as caregivers. This counseling helps children and adults heal emotionally and spiritually from a life filled with sickness, extreme poverty, death of loved ones, or other situations from their life. Forgotten Voices staff and its church partners regularly attend training to continuously improve their counseling skillset.

To effectively demonstrate the love of Christ, Forgotten Voices and its church partners disciple children and caregivers. That means, children and caregivers are prayed for, encouraged in their faith, and learn of God’s love for them. As a church-based ministry, children and caregivers are regularly invited into a life-transforming relationship with Jesus Christ. On Christian holidays, our church partners often throw special events for the orphaned and vulnerable children so they get to experience the love of a community.

To equip first-time caregivers with skills they need to care for their children, Forgotten Voices and its church partners offers a variety of parenting support. Caregivers attended Forgotten Voices-led workshops to become equipped with parenting skills, practical tips, counseling assistance, and more. Because many of these caregivers live in extreme poverty or lacked a parent figure growing up, these workshops help restore family relationships and strengthen a caregiver’s ability to successfully raise a child and take better care of them. Depending on a caregiver’s ability, Forgotten Voices may temporarily offer support with food, medicine, and other basic supplies to carry a family through a difficult season.

To create long-lasting change and empower caregivers to care for children, Forgotten Voices and its church partners economically empower their caregivers. That way, caregivers can better support and meet their family’s needs. Economic empowerment takes many shapes and depends on the local context. Oftentimes, caregivers will receive skills, business, or agriculture training, investments into their small business, seeds for farming or livestock. This helps a caregiver generate income for themselves.

Forgotten Voices also has created and manages 52 savings and credits associations (SCAs)for caregivers to safely save money, invest in local ventures, and receive discipleship. These SCAs provide empowerment to over 250 caregivers.