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Around the world many things are broken. Our vision at Flatirons is "To bring the awesome life of Christ to a lost and broken world. As followers of Christ, it is one of our tasks to share the love God has for us with words and with our actions. We know that the needs in this world can, at times, be overwhelming. However, we must not let this sense of being overwhelmed drive us to despair. Rather it must drive us to engage. At Flatirons we have chosen to engage with the world by developing a limited number of deep and meaningful relationships with organizations based on the following principles:
Our desire is to partner with likeminded organizations in order to be used by God in His work of transforming lives... including our own. It is our hope to develop partnerships in which we are "...delighted to share with you not only the Gospel of God but our lives as well, because you had become so dear to us." 1 Thessalonians 2:8. |
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Since 2007, Flatirons has been in partnership with a NGO (Non-Governmental Organization) that focuses most of its attention on community development in Afghanistan. Afghanistan ranks 181st out of 182 countries on the UN Human Development Index (the UN HDI measures life expectancy, education, and standard of living). This organization focuses on transformational development through initiatives in health care, education, and economics. Flatirons’ primary involvement with this organization rests in its focus on working with returning Afghan refugees and IDPs (Internally Displaced People). Since 2002, more than 5 million Afghan refugees have returned to their home country, increasing the population by over 20% according to the UN High Commission for Refugees. This scale of people returning to a country that has suffered from decades of war puts a great deal of stress on infrastructures that have been destroyed. Flatirons has helped fund three key infrastructures in a new community made up of around 4,000 former IDPs: a school, a clinic, and a water system that provides safe drinking water. Flatirons continues to help fund these ongoing operations in partnership with the NGO to create a sustainable economic situation for the residents of this new community. Click here to download the Information Packet about short-term trips to Afghanistan. Check back here for the schedule and dates for 2011 short-term trips to Afghanistan. |
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The recent flooding in Pakistan is also impacting neighboring Afghanistan, where the UN reports more than 3,500 homes have been destroyed. Our friends in Afghanistan emailed us for help in a community just south of Kabul that has been devastated by the rising water. We want to supply at least 550 affected families with food, clean water, tents, blankets and a mobile health clinic. This will cost about $50,000. This weekend (August 28/29) we are providing an opportunity for flatirons to meet this need in the Clear Box in the Lobby.
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At the end of 2009, Flatirons entered into a partnership with an organization working among the urban poor in Mexico City. In cooperation with Servant Partners (www.servantpartners.org ), a Mexican NGO named TUI (Transformacion Urbana Internacional) works in a community called Chimalhuacan. According to Geneva Global, in 2008 over 1 billion people (a third of the world's urban population) lived in slums - areas of substandard housing that lack adequate water, city services, healthcare, education, and other basic human needs. Members of the TUI team hail from such places as Switzerland, New Zealand, Zimbabwe, El Salvador, and Mexico. They live in Chimalhuacan and have developed, in cooperation with community leaders from Chimalhuacan, several projects: Youth as Agents of Change, a community health initiative, an initiative to develop healthy children, a holistic church planting initiative, and a number of initiatives to help provide better livelihoods. While all these initiatives are aimed at the transformation of Chimalhuacan, the hope is that each initiative is being carefully evaluated and documented in order to develop templates that can be effectively used to transform slums around the world. Join us for an Interest Meeting about the October 26-31 Entrepreneur’s Team to Mexico City. We are looking for people with a variety of business experience (marketing, human resources, business processes) who have taken an idea to fruition and know what it takes to make that happen. Click here to download the Information Packet about short-term trips to Mexico. Check back here for the schedule and dates for 2011 short-term trips to Mexico.
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For more information contact:
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