Samaritan’s Foundation turns 1000 (houses)

Mission Direct partners The Samaritan’s Foundation are set to celebrate the completion of their 1,000th house in the coming month. The houses, which currently cost around £2,700 each to construct, are built for the slum-dwelling communities in the north-western  Sosua region of The Dominican Republic. Many of the families re-housed have fled from neighbouring Haiti to escape poverty, violence and natural disasters.

The project was founded in by Italian businessman Elio Medonia and his wife Lena after coming face to face with extreme poverty whilst on holiday in the DR. The first new village was inaugurated twenty years ago, and building has since grown exponentially – housing some of the many thousands that live in bitter poverty and squalor.  

Mission Direct began partnering with the Samaritan’s Foundation in 2007 and volunteers have helped in the construction of XX of the homes. Each team is able to complete work on one of the houses and hand over the keys to a family. Mission Direct’s founder Nigel Hyde paid tribute to the Medonias, saying that “Through the Elio and Lena’s faithfulness to God’s calling, many thousands of lives in the Dominican Republic have been blessed and transformed forever. They are an inspiration and a reminder of the incredible power of saying ‘yes’ to God.”

Colleagues of the couple are compiling a ‘book of memories’ to be given to the Medonias at the inauguration of home number one thousand in February. Anyone who has been on a Mission Direct trip to the DR is encouraged to send a greeting via Mission Direct This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it (see this month’s competition for more details)

To learn more about Mission Direct trips to the Dominican republic go to: www.missiondirect.org/countries/dr