I've been back for a week and tried to sort out priorities. First off I owe you dear reader a year end report. That will have to come another day. The days and nights have been fast and furious and tons of tiny details and challenges are presented everyday. Most are left unresolved but not for lack of attempting to address.
Our big news is that one of the foundations employees was kidnapped and assaulted last week and barely escaped with her life. After two days in the hospital she is resting well at home. The known details are too sordid to account in this format, suffice to say it is deeply disturbing and quite frightening.
The constant high level of both petty and violent crimes appears at least annectodatally to be increasing. The offered statistics confirm that but dramatically under-report most crimes. It is the start of the presidential electioneering cycle and the President's wife is going to try to change the Constitution so that she may run for the Presidency. Law and Order is on the minds of most citizens and this administration has been deliberately lax on law enforcement.
We are trying to transfer a young man to a permanent Catholic facility in order to better treat his various handicap. Julius is 14 years old and has an extremely low intelligence, profound epilepsy and severe autism. He is a sweet natured kid, but rarely ventures out of his own autistic world. We visited his step grandfather today and got a lot more detailed analysis of his childhood prior to instituionalization two years ago.
STOP READING here if you are squeamish. This is frightening stuff. Even if only half is true, it will break your heart. We believe that his Mother attempted to abort Julius during the pregnancy. When the liquid abortion failed she gave birth to the boy and somehow managed to keep him alive till he was seven years old. Supposedly, she was visiting her Mother (the grandmother) and she left him for "just a minute" to run to the corner store. She never returned for him. The Grandmother who was in poor health and great poverty tried to help the boy for five years before pursuing goverrnment help for his condition.
Again, please stop reading if you like.... it gets worse if that is possible. We believe that his Mother is a lady of ill repute, but still is alive and living in the capital city. The boy's torso is covered with scars. The best case theory would have the scars be the result of bug bites that were infected and scratched. A more malevolent possible scenario would be cigarette burns or the like. Additional evidence indicates that Julius was abused sexually and perhaps in child prostitution. It does not get much worse than that.
The step grandfather is my hero. He provided for the boy and the grandmother for 5 years and is also a weekly visitor to our center to help feed and nurture the boy. His step grandfather does more than almost all family members of others kids at the center. Not only that but the Mother and Grandmother have not visited him even once.
We have an appointment with a Judge in the near future that will give Julius the opportunity to possibly spend the rest of his life in an excellent Catholic Hospital that helps kids like him.
He has rallied recently and is doing much better in his circumstances with us, but fluctuating levels of government support as well as his specific diagnosis lead us to the firm conviction that his life will have much greater chance of success in the aforementioned Hospital.
Dear Reader, I have left out and changed names in this note. I assure you that most of the facts as I know them are accurate. I have come to be extremely skeptical of what I hear and even sometimes doubt what I see. I know that Jesus loves this little boy and in some weird way He must love the Mother too. Though nearly overcome with anger and disgust towards this woman that I have never met, I know that I too must pray for her: even though I don't want to.
For those of you who have visited or volunteered here, you know the boy I am talking about. Feel free to contact me with additional questions or prayer warrior activities.
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