Let me explain: most of the time this is the best job in the world. You meet lots of nice people and help them overcome problems in their lives. These can be physical or psychological and we make a big difference in reducing pain and suffering. We care for the carers and by acting quickly we can usually have people back in the parish far sooner than would normally be the case.
But as many of you know, we do not just support Clergy in the UK; we support them throughout the worldwide Anglican Communion and as we have more Anglicans in Nigeria than in Britain and America combined, more and more calls for helps are coming from overseas.

At the moment we are probably running at three requests a week of people we could help, if only we had the funds available. The greater the obstacle the more glory in overcoming it is a worthy thought, but we can’t overcome all of the obstacles without help. Some will get left by the wayside and that means playing God, choosing quite literally who will live and who will die.

The worst ones are when you know their names, and for this newsletter I am going to share a name with you, Lya Leghase.

Lya is 19 and is from Eritrea. Remember family members are also treated by the hospital, so she is entitled to treatment here. But this treatment is something special, Lya is going to die without heart surgery, and die within the next year.

At the age of 17 Lya contracted Rheumatic Fever, a disease just about eradicated here, but prevalent throughout the third world. She recovered but as happens with 80% of females who get the fever she has contracted Mitral Stenosis, a heart valve disease that will eventually cause the heart to stop working and she will die, either of heart failure or pneumonia.

I always struggle with the big picture arguments, do it for this one and you will be overwhelmed. We have not been approached by the world, but by one person with a name, an identity, and we can save her life, but how much is a life worth?

If it were your daughter would you re-mortgage the house for the operation? Of course you would but her father has no house to mortgage, no bank to borrow money from and no assets to sell. He is operating on the front line of Christianity; fighting persecution and daily problems we can only have nightmares about.

Now he is reliant on the kindness of strangers to help his only daughter.

We can provide the surgeon, we can provide the after care, we can do much. But we need £40,000 to pay for what we cannot do. That is a lot of money, enough to keep the hospital going for a week. Even worse we have to have it by November, Lya will be too ill to travel next year. This has to be a special appeal and we have to move quickly.

This is the best job in the world, because we can touch people’s lives and make a difference. Please help the hospital touch the life of Lya Leghase.   

John Cherry
Chief Executive