Thanks to the generosity of Dumbarton members who fulfilled their 2023 pledges, our church was able to help fund the work of 20 organizations through our Mission and Outreach Fund. Here are five of the groups that we supported:
- UMCOR’s Mar Elias Peace Study Center: Scholarships for students at the Mar Elias Educational Institutions (MEEI) to equip new generations of the brightest Christian, Muslim, Jewish and Druze students in Israel/Palestine to know “The Other,” to be creative problem-solvers and bridge-builders, and to become key leaders in their professions and society. MEEI provides one of very few places within Israel where a mixed population gets to know each other deeply, fostering friendships that, sadly, are uncommon.
- UMCOR’s Gaza Relief Fund: Emergency grants to local partners in Israel and Gaza for relocation support, food and hygiene kits for internally displaced people, psychosocial treatment and trauma counseling to women and children, and telemedicine services for disabled children in need of follow-up care, but without safe access to a clinic.
- Washington Interfaith Network (WIN): Broad-based, multi-racial, multi-faith, strictly non-partisan, District-wide citizens’ power organization rooted in local congregations and associations. WIN is committed to training and developing neighborhood leaders, addressing community issues, and holding elected and corporate officials accountable in Washington, DC. DUMC is a dues-paying member organization.
- Ward 8 Conservancy: A grassroots nonprofit that works to rejuvenate the more than 500 acres of forest in Ward 8 by engaging residents as paid staff and as volunteers to pick up trash, restore the woodland ecology, and build trails. The Park Steward program employs Ward 8 residents who face barriers to employment in the work of forest remediation and trains them for these and other green jobs.
- Give Ye Them to Eat (GYTTE): A Puebla, Mexico-based organization that works with impoverished rural families in different kinds of development: appropriate technology (thermal housing with mud and straw; ecological toilets, wood-saving stoves and more); comprehensive community-based health, agriculture and small animal-raising and church and faith development as well as hosting UMC groups who work, study and become aware of the reality of impoverished Mexicans and many of the root causes of migration to the United States.