For children in poverty, school can be a source of shame. When their parents are behind on school fees, they get called out by the staff for it. They get letters and phone calls at home, urging the parents to pay. And if that doesn’t help, they get expelled, until their parents can pay.
Imagine your friends asking you why you didn’t show up for class. Admitting “my parents are too poor to pay the fees” is not something any child wants to do. So, these children may end up avoiding their peers.
They could also end up dropping out of education altogether, and being forced to work from a young age to support the family, or perhaps to keep in school the one sibling who seems most promising.
Another source of shame can be clothing. In Asian countries, many schools require uniforms. What if your parents can’t afford to buy a new one when you grow out of your old one? Would you like to be seen going to school in clothes that are too small or worn out? Or with a row of decaying teeth, because your parents can’t afford dental care? Or without proper stationary or a good schoolbag? Or would you like to walk an hour or more in all weathers while your peers take the school bus, which your parents can’t afford?
No child should lay awake worrying about these things, but many are. And many of these are our brothers and sisters, who have been cut off from family assistance or have lost jobs precisely because they believe in Jesus. For example, our fieldworker writes about one family in Iran:
“Soon after Maryam became a follower of Jesus, she was rejected by her family. Her daughters are seven and twelve years old. Due to financial circumstances, she lives with her children in her father-in-law’s car park. Her daughters do not have proper nutrition and are underweight. Their teeth are completely damaged and because of lack of finances she cannot meet the medical needs of her children. Her daughters do not have many clothes that fit them and they also lack underwear and basic needs to be able to attend school.”
Also, some of the evangelists of the house churches find their families must pay a heavy price. Some of their children have even had to drop out of school altogether. For example, one daughter of a sister who was in prison for many years had to drop out of the school she was attending. She was in a special class for gifted children, and she has been praying God will allow her to go back to school.
It is the reason our Martyrs Scholarship Fund exists. Our brothers and sisters who face persecution already carry heavy burdens. We don’t want them to also carry the burden of shame about not being able to educate their children. And we don’t want children to go to school ashamed for not having what they need.
With your help in these past months, we were able to pay school fees for the children of a pastor who was in prison for many years in South-East Asia. We were also able to help more than a dozen children in Iran whose Christian parents could no longer provide for their education and basic needs.
These were some responses we got from parents:
“I am so happy that I paid the cost of my class to my teacher and was not ashamed of it… I am so thankful for you and how blessed the gift of Jesus Christ is.”
“I thank you with all my heart that this year my child will no longer walk to school in this cold and rain. The school bus will pick him up at his door. Now that I am typing this text, I am shedding tears. Thank you for the glory of God who is bringing these days to me.”
“I really thank you my sisters and brothers in Christ Jesus. For the expenses of my child that you helped. For this month, I was able to pay the school service fee and the school tuition fee for my daughter’s math class, which had been behind for several months and I could not afford to pay, both I and my daughter were really upset about this issue and my daughter was constantly stressed about not saying in front of her friends and the manager and the service that she was in debt. Your kindness and love helped us a lot. I thank you all in the name of Jesus.”
“Your kindness and love for my children made their hearts so happy that the night this blessing was bestowed, they were up late from excitement and could not sleep from happiness. It was as if their father had returned and was with them. The sadness in their hearts has turned into great joy for them. Thank God that my children, although their earthly father is not with them, have a heavenly father who takes their hand in time and is a father to them. Thank God and you, my dear ones for helping my children get an education.”
