A Plea for Aid in Cali, Colombia

On both of my visits to Cali, I was fortunate enough to get to spend some time in the Colegio Americano in San Marcos. San Marcos is an impoverished barrio in Cali. A teacher at the school told me that unemployment in this particular neighborhood is at about 80%. "It's not that the people don't want to work," she explained. "It's just that there are no jobs."

San Marcos is an invasion zone. That is, it's an area of land on the outskirts of a city where displaced families have rushed in and built crude shacks. Typically, Colombia's displaced are people who have fled from their homes in the mountains to Colombia's urban areas in order to escape guerilla violence. Former missionary to Colombia John Lovelace says that the poorest of the poor live in these invasion zones.

The news from Cali this week comes from our friend Boyce Wallace, who -- along with his wife Beth -- has been a missionary to Colombia for 43 years. Boyce writes: "There was a terrible fire in an invasion zone where San Marcos has a mission and a small school. Around 100 houses were burned down. They were wooden shacks and people lost everything. We are trying to get organized to offer relief."

If you would like to help the people of San Marcos, make your check to Boyce Wallace. Earmark the donation "for San Marcos" and send it to John Lovelace, 814 Crestwood Drive, Evansville, IN 47715. John will deposit your donation directly into Boyce's account so that he can begin to put the money to use immediately. Please drop me an e-mail to let me know the amount of your donation so that we can let Boyce know the money is coming.

Thanks for your continued support of our friends in Cali, Colombia.

(About the photo: Students in a San Marcos classroom show off their English language skills during our visit in September 2005. Photo by Sam Suddarth.)