Myanmar (MNN) — Cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar with incredible force in May. More than 100,000 people were killed in the disaster. More than a million lost everything.
Now, there's good news and bad news, says Vision Beyond Borders Founder and President Patrick Klein who just returned from Myanmar. "We saw a lot of rice patties, and so, thankfully, there is a lot of rice in the ground. Hopefully there will be enough food to go around. That's what we're praying."
However, Klein says the cyclone has left thousands of orphans. "There [are] 80,000 children that are homeless. We've heard reports there are pedophiles from Thailand going in to get these kids and take them in to be sex slaves over in Thailand. The military government is trying to get the young boys and put them into military service."
Christian children are being spiritually victimized. "We've heard stories of even Christian kids being put into Buddhist temples and monasteries. They're trying to get these Christian kids to renounce Jesus Christ and raise them as Buddhist monks."
Vision Beyond Borders is trying to do something about it. Klein says, "We bought some land recently. We're trying to set up four new orphanages. And we're trying to get these kids as fast as possible — build these orphanages, get Christians to run them, and get the kids in as soon as we can so we can keep them away from these predators."
Klein says it's incredible to think that evil is making a bad situation worse. "These people have endured so much, and to think that these predators would go and get these kids who have lost their families, and who have seen their villages destroyed. [They] get these kids and then take them into Thailand into sex slavery. It just breaks your heart. I say, 'God, please, please do something — help us to reach these kids.'"
Initially they want to build four small children's homes. Funding is the biggest need. He says, "For about $30,000 we can build a new house, which would house about 100 kids. And then, we're doing a bigger one that's about $84,000, and that would house 500 to 1,000 kids."
The money you provide would protect these kids from from child sex slavery, but these homes would expose them to the Gospel. "They will all be run by Christians–a Christian mother and father who oversee the kids. All the staff will be Christians. And, we're hoping that even [North American] churches would adopt a children's home and then even send a team once or twice a year to go visit those kids and minister to those kids."
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