Zurich/Port-au-Prince. District Apostle Leonard Kolb from the USA has stated in a press release that a large-scale delivery operation of relief supplies for earthquake victims in Haiti has begun. Many members of the New Apostolic Church have sent donations to the accounts of the various relief organisations. The majority of our Church’s members on the Caribbean island have survived the devastating natural disaster, but like all other Haitians, are still greatly dependent on help and support.

District Apostle Kolb is responsible for the pastoral and administrative care of the New Apostolic Church in Haiti. The scale of the catastrophe is only slowly becoming clear. Millions of people are in need of food, water, medicine, and a roof over their heads. District Apostle Kolb reports that, wherever possible, the Church in the USA will work in cooperation with aid organisations already at work on the island, as well as with the American government’s Bureau of Humanitarian Affairs. The intent is to help in as concrete and effective a manner as possible. A total of US $45,000 from the New Apostolic relief organisation known as the “World Relief Fund” has already been delivered for preliminary support and supplies, and another sum in the same amount has been made available as needed.  

District Elder Thenor, who resides in Haiti and is himself a doctor, is coordinating the efforts of the “World Relief Fund”. Along with Bishop Segura from the neighbouring Dominican Republic and District Evangelist Tildes from the USA, he is working to assure the delivery of relief supplies which need to be sent overland.

In order to provide current updates on the relief effort, the Church in the USA has set up its own Facebook page. It can be accessed from the website of the New Apostolic Church USA at www.nac-usa.org.

Other District Churches of the New Apostolic Church have also contributed generous amounts of emergency aid. District Apostle Kolb has also made reference to this overwhelming solidarity.

In the late afternoon of 12 January, Haiti was rocked by a serious earthquake with a magnitude of 7.0. The epicentre of the quake was some 15 kilometres to the southwest of the island’s capital, Port-au-Prince. Approximately 2,000 New Apostolic Christians live in Haiti.