Birth Center Saves MotherBaby Lives in Philippines

This past week something wonderful happened --a baby was born. Not just any baby, but the Great-Great-Grandbaby of the woman who's name and picture graces the front of our newest Birth Center in Mindoro island, Philippines.

Florencia was a midwife who died last year. She had presided over births on her island from the time she was 16 years old until just a few years before her passing at the age of 106. Florencia entered an arranged marriage at 17,  that would become over 70 years of happy marriage, 13 children and more than 100 decendants. 

Florencia lived through the final century of the 2nd millennium, a time that included terrible hardship for Filipinos during World War II, and massive cultural and developmental changes. She experienced grinding poverty most of her life, but reveled in the joys of family, community, church, and her work as a midwife.

On the day Florencia departed this life, we had just finished loading the truck on another island that would carry birth equipment and supplies to start the birth center in her home community of Aninuan. It was almost as if she were waiting for us to get a replacement in place before she could go to heaven.

Meddie, Florencia's granddaughter, is our birth assistant in the Florencia Memorial Birthing Home. Meddie has worked for Mercy In Action for over a decade and she is precious to us. This week she became a grandmother for the first time/ 

Generations. It all reminds me of the old folk song with these lines" And when I'm dead, and when I'm gone, there'll be one child born in this world to carry on...to carry on."

Welcome baby Elliah, you have a rich history as you take your place among the Generations.

Links:

• Mercy In Action website

While we were celebrating Christmas Day in the US, Oriental Mindoro, Philippines  was hit by a deadly typhoon square on on in the community where our Mercy In Action supported clinic was recently built .Thankfully, no lives were lost, and all our staff and their families, and the staff and families of the mission we partner with,  came through the storm ok physically, just frightened.  The  medical building was built strong and withstood the winds, but our head midwife and her assistant both lost the roof off of their home in the typhoon, and subsequently had their small homes flooded with rain water. 

So we go into 2017 rebuilding again, in a country that sees more than its fair share of natural disasters. Thank you for your wonderful support for our mission of bringing safe, respectful maternity care to the poorest of the poor in the Philippines. It makes a big difference.

If you would like to send notes of encouragement and/or prayers to our staff who are temporarily homeless, please send through our email at: info@mercyinaction.com.

And thank you for your donations, which are needed now more than ever. Our doors remain open on Mindoro island, in spite of the typhoons, and our team is ready to welcome any pregnant woman who needs assistance.

Links:

• Mercy In Action website