Thank you for your interest in helping the people of El Salvador! The rich history of this beautiful country is defended every day by its dedicated citizens, but the help of concerned citizens abroad goes a long way to providing resources and recognition to these folks.
Below are some organizations that we have become partners with over the past few years. They will lead you in the right direction in how to help.
The Cielo Azul Fund provides a basic living stipend for Salvadoran Baptist pastors Ruth and Alex Orantes, and supports outreach programs and development projects in communities they serve in El Salvador. The fund is administered by an advisory committee from The Simple Way, Central Baptist Church (Wayne, PA), and Iglesia Bautista Shekina (Santa Ana, El Salvador) which is pastored by Ruth Orantes.
Ruth and Alex's commitment to faith-based community development, justice, peacemaking, and healing has been a cherished model and inspiration for The Simple Way and for Central Baptist Church for many years. From 2003 to 2009, the original Orantes Fund supported the Orantes family in their pastoral work. Beginning in 2010, the newly renamed Cielo Azul Fund is committed to an even broader level of support not only for Ruth, Alex and their son Victor Hugo, but also for the programs that have arisen out of their ministries in the communities where they work – construction of a community center at Iglesia Bautista Shekina, health clinics and social services, youth leadership workshops, art and music activities for children, community Bible studies, education scholarships, and more.
In the weeks and months after the March 2009 election of Mauricio Funes as President of El Salvador (“the first President to support the needs of the poor in 150 years,” as one Salvadoran activist put it), there has been a new sense of great hope for the future of a people who have struggled so long for a dignified life free from political, economic and criminal violence.
The choice of a new name (Cielo Azul means“blue sky” in English) is an attempt to symbolize this new reality. And there are signs of a move in that direction. But continued reports of economic struggles and increasing violence in El Salvador remind us that hope can be very fragile.
More than ever, our friends in El Salvador need spiritual and material support to continue building communities based on faith, justice and service to all who are in need. Please consider a gift to the Cielo Azul fund in order to send a message of solidarity to Ruth and Alex and the communities where they work.
