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Author: CEDAR Fund

The Letter from CEDAR | March 2019

Dear Friends of CEDAR, Few weeks ago, I took a train to Yuen Long for a meeting. Arriving at the train station’s lobby, I heard a loud and angry voice with foul languages from a short distance. A young man was yelling at a Station Assistant because the ticketing machines would not take his HK$100 note and he was in a hurry. The Assistant patiently advised him to purchase a ticket from the ticketing office. At the ticketing office, right after handing in the HK$100 note, he started scolding again for the same issue. The staff then had to respond to his complaint, instead of getting him a ticket. I didn’t stop to see how he finally got

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How do Churches Instill Hopes to People in the Midst of Disaster?

Banner image: Herda, elder of Boladangko Church (Right) and Cynthia, who lost her father Written by: Jady Sit (Communications Officer) In early November 2018, a few CEDAR’s staffs visited Sulawesi of Indonesia to learn about the local conditions from partner PESAT and visit families devastated by the earthquake. The article below is our staff’s sharing after her visit. If you would like to understand more about CEDAR’s relief work there, please visit the page “Indonesian Earthquake and Tsunami Relief”. “During the earthquake, the door was locked, and thus Cynthia’s father was trapped inside the house. When it collapsed, he died,” Herda, an elder at the Boladangko Church, said emotionally with her arm surrounding Cynthia. Sulawesi was struck by an

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Indonesia Earthquake & Tsunami Relief Enters New Stage CEDAR Continues to Help the Affected on Recovery

Banner image: CEDAR’s Indonesia’s partner, PESAT, meets with representatives of an affected community and talk about their livelihood needs CEDAR and its local partner completed the first phase of relief work (until November 2018) in central Sulawesi, Indonesia, where earthquake and tsunami hit last September. CEDAR allocated a fund of 20,000 US Dollars (around HK$150,000) to support its partner, PESAT, in the first phase to distribute emergency food, cooking kits, hygiene kits and medication to 1,347 affected families. Last November, chief executive of CEDAR Fund, Dr. Raymond Kwong and two staff visited Sulawesi, and learned about partner’s post-disaster work, visited the affected people, and explored further response work through our partner. After a few days of visitation, observation,

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CEDAR Calls for Emergency Assistance for Chin People Living in Conflicts in Myanmar

Since December 2018, the conflict between the Tatmadaw (Myanmar’s military) and the Arakan Army (AA, Rakhine rebels) in southern Chin State and northern Rakhine State had escalated, which had caused 6,000 people homeless till the mid of February. In the first week of February, there were over 180 villagers from Paletwa in Chin State fled to Bangladesh. CEDAR’s partner in Myanmar stated that there were at least 20 temporary campsites built along the border. The diaspora sojourning in the campsites urgently needs humanitarian aids now. CEDAR funded our partner* USD 18,000 (approximately HKD 141,300) this February to provide 6 days of food and blankets to 218 families from Paletwa in the temporary campsites. Temperature difference at the campsite

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“Care for the Poor in Tandem with Evangelism.” – Sharing from an Overseas Chinese Supporter

Banner image: Karen Mak, a CEDAR’s Supporter Karen, who resides in Australia, always pays a visit to CEDAR’s office whenever she returns to Hong Kong, even for a short stay. Last year, Karen came to the office again with two huge bags of Australian snacks. She chatted with us like chatting with old friends. We jumped at the opportunity and invited her to share with us her reasons of persistent support to CEDAR over the years. “People in developing countries have very different conditions than those in developed countries. We cannot use methods adopted in developed countries to help those in developing countries,” said Karen. Although Karen lives in Australia, her heart has always been with ministries of

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Engage Students in Issue of Global Poverty – a Primary School Teacher’s Vision

Banner image: Ms. Jade Lee, CEDAR’s working partner of education ministry in HK ‘How many human traffickers are there in the world at present?’ ‘Apart from Hong Kong, will CEDAR Fund be raising funds for poor children in other places?’ In January this year, CEDAR went to a school under the Direct Subsidy Scheme in Shek Kip Mei to give a talk, which so interested the Primary 5 students in the audience that they raised their hands and asked many questions afterwards. The topic of the talk was ‘Anti-human trafficking’. Our staff explained the definition of human trafficking, talked about how some children in Asia and Africa have been trafficked in the past and described how we can

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What is the Function of a Church in the Community? – CEDAR’s Project Experience in China

“Suppose that a community that was moderately equipped with a food market or a supermarket, a hospital, a school, a police station, and a church. Now you are asked to get rid of one of these institutions, which one would it be?” Lorraine, one of our colleagues in China, posed this question to the participants during training programmes, and that one answer coincided among them was “the Church”. As the answer revealed that the market, the hospital, the school, and the police station remained a pivotal role in the operation of the community. So, where does the church stand? For the non-believers, a church that could be separated from the community was merely an accessory, apart from the

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Education on Helping the Poor Starts from a Young Age: Interview with the Rev. Eugene Leung of E.F.C.C. Jachin Church

Written by: Edward Lai How many clothes do you have in your wardrobe? You probably don’t remember the exact number, and you’d probably say: “I don’t know.” The truth is possibly that there are numerous items. Like many people in Hong Kong, The Rev. Eugene Leung owns more clothes than he needs. When a staff from CEDAR raised the question at a church gathering, The Reverend, who was present, realised that he owned the most clothes. That said, isn’t it normal to own more than what you need? The Rev. Eugene Leung Eugene Leung said, “I’d never thought about whether I needed that many clothes. The way the fashion industry works these days is that when I’m replacing

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Whose Neighbours Do I Want to Become?

Written by: The Reverend Anders Chan Ming-chuen (Board Member of CEDAR, Associate Senior Pastor of Mongkok Baptist Church) The parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37 is a well-known passage of scripture. An expert in the law asked Jesus to provide an objective definition for the word “neighbour”, but his real intention was to justify his xenophobic point of view – there were people whom he did not have the obligation to love (to him, “neighbour” probably only referred to other Jews). This reflected the sense of national superiority of the expert in the law and his moral values. Even though the Jews did not have their own country at the time, they still prided themselves in

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Let the Community Be Responsible for Their Children’s Education

Education is a very important part of eradicating poverty. Yet, many children living in low-income countries do not have the opportunity to receive proper education. Their parents are usually occupied by work to earn a living to put food on the table, thus they seldom think about the future of their children, who they thought would likely share similar fate like them. Because in their eyes, earning income to support their families is more important than getting an educational access for their children. We understand that if parents do not see the importance of education, they will not send their children to schools. Therefore, CEDAR has worked with World Concern Bangladesh and churches in the country to start

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