Rehoboth Children’s Home in the Philippines - Project: 006

The Rehoboth Children’s Home has been supported by Siloam Christian Ministries here in the UK after our Southeast area Representative Don Foster was recommended to check the project out many years ago. Prior to this Siloam helped to establish and support the ‘Shalom Bata’ children’s/baby rescue centre but that ceased to operate when the UK management personnel returned to the UK because of ill-health.

The Rehoboth home was established by two Australians Mr & Mrs Morriss who had been given the vision to set up a Baby Rescue Centre which would be fully staffed and managed by Filipino workers. The project has grown from small beginnings to now where it is licensed to care for 48 abandoned children, which is fully supervised by the Filipino Social Services (DSWD).

The project is situated at Sampaloc in Rizal province about an hour away from Manila’s airport.

The project has its own site upon which it has a baby rescue centre and the children’s or toddlers’ room and a recently constructed medical centre and dental clinic, still awaiting to be fully staffed by local medical practitioners.

The children are rescued or abandoned and most have been abused in some way. Several of the staff of 19 have been with the home since it started over a decade ago. Siblings are also catered for and where possible, the children are reunited with their Filipino families if the conditions are suitable and meet the requirements of the Social Services. Otherwise, the children can be put up for inter-country adoptions where the children can go to ‘forever families’ in the U.S.A, Europe and Australia.

Sadly, many of the children are physically challenged which is why many have been abandoned.
Over the past 6½ years, Siloam has provided £86,738 in financial support. On average, over £13,000 per year has been provided by UK donors via Siloam Christian Ministries.

The home has a capacity to care for 24 babies and 24 older children. The Bonnie’s Heart Baby Home is custom designed for 24 babies and children under the age of three. There is a baby wing and a toddler wing with child size bathrooms, built in baby baths and age appropriate toys and play equipment. There is also a playground for outdoor activities. Across the road are the Morriss’ house and Reufer House, which were the original buildings of Rehoboth. Rehoboth takes its name from the Holy Scriptures where Isaac thanks the Lord. “At last the Lord has created enough space for us to prosper in this land.” Genesis 26:22.

Every child at Rehoboth has a unique story and even the youngest of the children who arrive come with heavy baggage consisting of the pages of their short history weighed down with either abandonment, abuse, neglect and the death of either one or both parents.

What has to be realised is that these children are all innocent. Their whole life situation is out of their control and their problems were created by others. Being surrendered for adoption is no easy matter and heartrending for a desperate mother who is unable to look after a physically challenged child or unable to feed another mouth because of poverty.

Some children remain at Rehoboth sometimes for as few as 10 months but others for more than 5 years until a ‘forever family’ can be arranged usually in another country. If the staff are able to place the child in a Filipino adoptive or foster home or even reunite the child with their parents if their social situation has improved, that sometimes happens.

Social workers tirelessly process paperwork so that these deserving children can either be reunited with their birth families or placed for adoption. But, the process is long, complex and needfully thorough and involves much fieldwork to investigate all the avenues for appropriate care for the child including full observation and documentation of the history and wellbeing of the child. All work is scrutinised by the Courts of Law and the Department of Social Welfare and other adoption organisations to ensure that every possible avenue has been explored for the best possible outcome for the child. Many of Rehoboth children have happily found new homes with ‘forever families’ domestically in the Philippines and around the world including Australia, Italy, Spain, Finland, Canada and the United States but sadly hardly any in the United Kingdom because of our strict inter-country adoption laws.

To sum up, Rehoboth provides the background for an early positive chapter in a child’s story which is caring, nurturing, loving and fun – with no fear of abuse, neglect or abandonment and all hope for a loving and caring family. Rehoboth’s children are happy, well cared for and loved.

We are grateful to Phil Thorburn who is a UK national living in the Philippines, who sits on the Rehoboth Board and keeps us up-to-date with the home’s activities and progress. Our Siloam Representative for S.E. Asia, Don Foster regularly visits Rehoboth on his twice a year Far East missions tours.

For further information, please go to Rehoboth’s website at: www.rehobothsampalocministries.com but if you are a UK national and want to increase the value of your donation by accessing the benefit of ‘gift aid’ then please click on the gift aid button below to download and complete a ‘gift aid’ declaration form to increase the value of your gift to Rehoboth by 25% (as at October 2020).

The following scripture in Psalm 27: 10 seems appropriate for the caring ministry of Rehoboth performed by the dedicated workers of this practical expression of God’s love.

“When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.”

Standing Order Form

Gift Aid Form

Want to make a donation by bank transfer?

We would welcome larger donations by bank transfer to save PayPal fees. To make a donation, please log onto your bank online or call them and use the following details to make a payment: Siloam Christian Ministries, Account Number: 00932329, Sort code: 60-12-35 Bank Address: NatWest, 59 The Parade, Leamington Spa, CV32 4ZX. Please Quote Reference: Project: 006, your Initials and Surname.

LATEST PROJECT UPDATE

rehoboth image 2

Children during early morning exercise.

rehoboth image 2

Children enjoying the swing and eating mango.

rehoboth image 3

Children enjoying ice cream.

rehoboth image 4

The children playing outside the home.

rehoboth image 5

Children doing their art crafts. A routine indoor activity.

rehoboth image 6

The children enjoying school lessons.

<