A Boat for Pastoral Work in the Amazon Region of Brazil
Friday, April 28, 2017

This community urgently needs a new boat, made of more durable materials, which will better withstand the difficult conditions and enable them to carry out their valuable work of service more quickly and safely. Can you help?

The Catholic community “Mar a Dentro” (“Out into the deep”) runs a pastoral center in the city of Belem in northern Brazil. There they hold prayer meetings, Eucharistic adoration, prepare young people for confirmation and help young couples for the sacrament of matrimony. They also care for close to 60 children and provide psychological support and counseling.

The members of this community do not merely confine themselves to the city. Faithful to the words of Jesus to Peter: “Duc in Altum,”  “Put out into the deep” (Lk. 5:4) – as the name of their community suggests – they have for nine years now also been ministering to the people living in the jungle on the riverside and the river islands in the Amazon region of northern Brazil. Villages that can only be reached by boat.

Through their apostolate the community is able to guarantee a continuing presence of the Catholic Church in this inaccessible region. The people living in these villages need help in every respect – pastoral care, spiritual and material support, counseling, among other needs. In this way the community is helping more than 400 families to grow in their faith, come to a better understanding of the Gospel message and to play a more active role in the life of the Church.

The community is also helping the people in their social and other needs and providing them with vital basic necessities. There are roughly a hundred volunteers, working in turns in this apostolate, which literally takes them to the margins of society. Many of them are able to bring their daily professional experience to bear for the benefit of the needy in these communities.

Until now the community has only had an old wooden boat available, and it is already in a poor state of repair. They urgently need a new boat, made of more durable materials, which will better withstand the difficult conditions and enable them to carry out this work of service more quickly and safely; they will then also be able to visit the riverside settlements more frequently.

We are planning to give $35,800, so that they can purchase a new, aluminum hulled boat.

Will you help us keep our promise to this Catholic community so that they can use their new boat to better carry out their pastoral work in the Amazon region of Brazil?

Progress: 0% Raised: $ 150     Goal: $ 35800

Code: 212-07-29

Return to Projects in Need

Aid to the Church in Need commits to invest your funds where they will have the greatest impact for the Church that we serve. Funds donated to Aid to the Church in Need’s projects will be used towards the greatest need in our programs to help keep the Faith alive.