Pastor Sell's Blog will Really be a Blog Now.

It's exciting to see Friends of Mercy continue to move forward. Our new and improved web site will have so much more information than before. We will be able to update it regularly. That means that this blog will really function more like a blog than an announcement or advertisement blog.

I will be able to provide more information here about my travels and some of the work we currently are getting done.

So, it will be worth your time to check back regularly. By the way, it is here that I'll write a daily diary from our upcoming trip to Kenya in October. As soon as our new web site is live at

(http://www.TheFriendsOfMercy.org/)

I'll take the time to reorganize this blog.

Look around our field test web site

New Field Test Site Here,

just remember it isn't live yet at our normal address above.

Blessings,

Pr. Mark Sell

Oprah Helps AIDS Orphans in Africa - Lutherans and Oprah Have Something in Common

Oprah is a great humanitarian, as everyone has heard. One of her projects is helping AIDS Orphans. At Friends of Mercy, we also realize there is much work to be done for millions of AIDS Orphans. What a blessing it is to show compassion and good works to others.

Friends of Mercy is the LCMS' way of reaching out to these children as Lutherans. Lutherans understand the Christian life as Faith and Mercy inseparably connected. The baptized child of God shows her love for God by loving others as one "raised in the new life." (Rom. 6)

Here are a couple of quotes from Oprah about what is going on in Africa.

"Every minute in Africa, 64 people die of AIDS. They have left behind a whole generation of children without parents, food or any way out.

There may be as many as 11 million of these orphans, according to the United Nations. It's as if every child under the age of 19 in New York were left to raise themselves. Few of them go to school, since few countries in Africa have public school systems. School costs money at least $250 a year and many orphans do not have the money for school. They are also too busy taking care of siblings.

What is a "Sibling Family?

In many parts of Africa and around the world, something called "sibling families" are being created: children left to take care of younger children. "I see myself in those children," Winfrey said. "Not only because their skin is black and I see myself in their eyes and feel myself in their hearts, but I came from that."
Read Oprah's article here.