We started the month with less that $1000 in the diocesan general fund. All of the below happened in the space of 48 hours - and there’s not much of a rule book for most of it …

3 of our 7 archdeacons came to see me with different requests. The first archdeacon’s grand-daughter was required to pay $150 by Saturday to sit her final year university exams. The archdeacon had just used all of the family savings on the marriage of another grand-daughter. The second archdeacon has problems with one of his schools. The school was housed in a temporary building but the owners were demanding it back. A local Christian offered land for the school, but the archdeacon needed $600 to buy a house next to the land and then to move it across. The third archdeacon phoned me to say he had been poisoned, the local hospital had conformed it and that a traditional healer had been to see him and wanted $50.

The youth department came with faith-filled (and uncosted …) plans for the next 3 years, to buy two motorbikes to raise funds, tackle teenage pregnancy, reverse illiteracy amongst the youth in the mineral-rich part of the diocese, write a book and promote peace between civilians and the army. Next an e-mail from the Mothers’ Union with their annual plans, including a long-standing vision to train local women in setting up a diocesan catering company - $5,000. Then the director of our new health department came with an invoice for $100 for medical costs for out theology students and a proposal to explore setting up a health centre, which would entail $1500 of ‘paperwork’ fees before we can get to first base. All great projects which would help the diocese and the local communities we serve.

I received last year’s accounts from our ‘Bilingual’ Anglican University, where out of the $11,500 charged in student fees for 60 students, only $3,500 had been paid, meaning that many of the teachers had not yet received anything for their lessons, neither had the rector nor any of the permanent staff drawn a salary. Today there was a meeting with the students to ‘strongly encourage’ payment. The Dean of the Theology Faculty then came to see me with a request for $15 / month for phone calls and photocopying exam papers etc.

On the positive side of the balance sheet, one of the archdeacons came with the diocesan quota from his 7 parishes - $20 for the last few months. A number of headteachers from our primary and secondary schools came to pay the required tithe ($10 / month) from each employed teacher ($200), Diocesan staff also paid their tithes ($100) and the university students paid $500 of their outstanding fees. Also I heard that Congo Church Association had received an anonymous donation for the Diocese of Goma of £500. Thank you God and whoever it was!

All of this makes financial management and any even medium-term planning an exciting and faith-stretching exercise in trusting God for the next few days and weeks in the life of the Diocese. But God has provided for us so far and will continue to do so as we trust in him for the future.

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12 May 2021