A week in the life of the White Eagle Project

Julius, our new deputy Manager and boys mentor, has been with River of Life for as long as i can remember - his Mum Betty is an Elder and leads the Hospital Ministry and other Community Outreach initiatives. Here are some extracts from his first weekly report - it gives you a flavour of what life as a White Eagle is like!

This week 7 of our boys and 1 girl did their Primary Leaving Examination (P.L.E). On Tuesday evening we went to the school to pick them up. On their arrival, they looked exited and free as if they were out of Jail ha, ha! Every one was happy for them and they commented on how they believe they are to pass with 1st grades. The next day we surprised them with a welcome back home party. Charles arranged music for the evening and the food was delicious. In the afternoon we took them to the pool to have fun and also see who can join in the swim on the 21st of November.

Three of our kids attended a worship gathering at Masaka Pentecostal Church; the boys and girls gave testimonies this week on how the Lord has blessed them to be part of this project - they were really touching; we had a sports evening; we continued the staff training on physical Intervention and different ways to help and support each other as colleagues in front of the children; Kelvin started crawling; In Youth Group we talked about The Power of the Tongue and over 18 youth came to the meeting, we got 4 that came for the 1st time.

This week I visited Hope and Good Foundation Schools to see how the children are doing. The headmistress thanked us in general for supporting the school. She continued to appreciate the way all the kids have behaved.

Spread the word on Facebook!

We're starting a campaign this autumn to spread the word about River of Life on Facebook. We're developing a fancy new Facebook Connect Gizmo that will help us easily tell all those hundreds of Facebook 'friends' most of us have by posting a message to our walls...

You'll see a little Facebook Connect button appear on the homepage, and throughout the rest of the site, and the idea is you just click on the button, write a short message like "I'm checking out the River of Life website" or something, and submit it to your wall... that then turns up in all your friends' newsfeeds, and they get a chance to click on the link and go check out the site. Ultimately we want to spread the word and gain support for the work :)

We've also got a Facebook Group you can join, and our own Facebook Page which I'm beginning to build...

Let me know what you think about it all, either by emailing me or leaving a comment below!

Latest newsletter is out!

We've just produced our latest newsletter which you can download here. It comes complete with a sponsorship form for the 10/10 hike - where the White Eagles will be doing a sponsored walk in Uganda and we can all raise sponsorship for them!

It contains some of the stories you can also read on this blog, plus more including prayer requests, 'news in brief' and more about the 10/10 hike.

Please do download it here and share it with your friends and family!

Can anyone sponsor Daniel or Veronica?

It costs on average just £60 per month to provide a home, an education, care, spiritual guidance, and of course decent grub for each White Eagle. We're looking for sponsors who can contribute any amount towards the costs for quite a few of the White Eagles, but we'll start with Daniel and Veronica!


Daniel is in P7 - the final year of primary school. With the all important Primary Leaving Exams coming up in December, he's buckling down to work harder than he's ever worked before!




Veronica is currently at secondary school. She joined us in 2008, we think the victim of a child traffiking attempt. She's wonderful - very helpful and kind!

If you can help, please get in touch by emailing us!

Pray for the sick with the Hospital Ministry

Every Monday, Betty and Jjaja Sarah visit Mulago Hospital in Masaka Town. For those of you who have visited and had a chance to join the team, you'll agree that Ugandan hospitals are something else, especially if a road traffic accident comes in while you're there - certainly helps you appreciate the NHS. There are few medicines, and few doctors. You can wait days to be seen. Day to day care is not done by nurses but by a relative or friend - but of course many have no one to look after them.

Betty and Jjaja (Grandma) Sarah faithfully visit those who have no one, praying for them, preaching, cutting their hair, giving a small amount of money, or fruit juice or soap or washing their clothes. In the holidays, the White Eagle Children often join the team to help out - and of course any one staying with us gets involved too!

Love the neglected with the Prison Ministry

River of Life Church has been working with other churches in Masaka to help and care for those in prisons - often the most scorned and neglected people in our community. Earlier this year, we felt called to put a fresh emphasis on this work, so now every month a team, led by Kayima, visits Masaka's notorious Prison. Conditions are appalling - mass overcrowding, people can wait years just to get to court, and they have to rely on relatives to bring basic things needed to live. Kayima says:

"So far we're going on well, we've found favour with God and the prison officers and the prisoners. The prisoners always appreciate the things we take to them, and we've seen 80 prisoners accept Jesus as their personal Saviour! Our prayer is to get a little more funding to provide for those that are in need like the new born babies and their mothers".

Big Charles goes to YWAM Uganda!

Big Charles is one of our first - he was the ring leader of the gang when the boys were still on the street. In February he was the first to pass his A Levels, and in March he joined the Disciple Training School at Youth With A Mission (YWAM).

He's had some tough times, but he writes: "God can pick you up from anywhere... He is able to do wonderful things to those who depend on Him!" Although it was hard at YWAM at first, he didn't want to leave by the end - "When I reached the school I asked myself when the six months were going to end because I was missing home a lot. But to my surprise when the time came, I never wanted to go home..."

The first half of the course was devoted to studying, and then he was let loose on the people of East Africa. He'd never left Uganda before, but he says "God started changing me... and he also used me to change other people. I went to Tanzania and I managed to preach to different churches and the last church I went to had 700 people!"

Charles has returned to us grown in wisdom and stature! He's extremely useful to have around, and has now started his Certificate in Business Administration.