Child Sponsorship

[Valandil]

Do any of you sponsor children through agencies which make those things available?

We do. What's amazing is how far just a little money to us (in relatively wealthy 'western' nations) goes in third world areas.

If you choose to do so, check out the organization you sponsor through. Some eat up the bulk of the money that comes in (maybe even 80% or more) in overhead costs - before any of it even gets overseas. Others pay exhorbitant fees to celebrity spokespersons - ironically, money not sent to help children, but it actually boosts total receipts for these organizations and that's why they use them.

We first sponsored a child through a very good group called 'World Vision'. Later, we found out that our own church had a similar sponsorship program at the denominational level, so we got into that instead (but kept sponsoring our World Vision child until that 'project' dovetailed).

So - just wanted to see if anyone else around here does so... I thought of this now because we just got a card from a little boy we sponsor in Lebanon. (Uh - we're addicts... we have multiple sponsorships!)