City of Refuge

Accra, Ghana

Today I participated in a service visit at the City of Refuge Children’s Village outside of Accra. Now, I know I’ve talked to you about these so-called service visits before, but this one actually had a service component. Shocking, I know.

The City of Refuge is an organization who seeks to rescue children who have been trafficked into the fishing industry. It also serves children who have been orphaned or abandoned. They have rescued about 80 kids since their founding in 2007. 35 kids currently live on site. They are really quite an amazing organization and in relation to the work that they do, there is nothing they haven’t thought of. They originally founded a school to serve the children who lived there, but saw a need in the community for all local children to have access to schooling. So they also run a school that currently serves 120 children from around the community. They are also in the process of building a high school for when the children age out of the current school. They also do outreach in the villages, employ single mothers who are most at risk for selling their children into trafficking, have installed a water purification system where they bag water for local people to sell, provide immunizations to community members, and the list goes on. While some people were off put by the religious nature of this organization, I was incredibly impressed at the attention to detail that was given to every aspect of these children’s lives. The founders, Stacy and her husband Johnbull, are incredibly inspirational people who make you realize that with a dream and some hard work, indeed anything is possible. To learn more about the City of Refuge Children’s Village, the amazing work they’re doing, and how you can help, please visit their website.