Until Alexander (the child who needed the heart surgery), we hadn’t asked for financial support on behalf of a specific child or family.

Which posts have you felt “focused on a family for the bloggers to offer additional economic aid” to?

All of the posts we publish, the ones that invite you into the lives of specific children or families, are meant to help you feel more connected with your child by giving you insight into what life is like for a Compassion-assisted child living in extreme poverty.

If our posts don’t do that, we consider ourselves successful if we give you insight into what life in your child’s country is like, or if we connect you with other people passionate about the same things you are.

We also strive to have our posts help you understand our ministry – how we work and why we do things the way we do – and help shape its direction.

The gift given to Kamrul was the result of a idea from our blog readers. It was unexpected and a pleasure to be a part of.

But it also identified an issue that our current gift policy, which was written before the advent of Twitter, Facebook and this blog, isn’t equipped to handle.

Any changes we may make to our gift policy will take into consideration the concerns you have because they’re our concerns too.

Thank you for letting us know of how having his own cycle van is helping him and his family!

David (FCS Compassion Bangladesh).

Originally Posted By Cheryl J I am wondering if there is any way we could donate some money so that Kamul could pay his step-brothers for the land he is on. It sounds like it is part of his father’s land. Perhaps then they could live in peace.

Hello everyone. Thank you for caring about Kamrul so much. Thank you for wanting to help him . . . and for wanting to help pretty much everyone you read about on the blog. You are all amazingly generous servants.

We appreciate everyone’s desire to step in and help Kamrul again, but it’s not something we can do at this time.

Giving the cycle van last year began a conversation in Compassion that is still going on. We are trying to determine how your desires, to help a sponsored child’s family that you do not sponsor, fit in with our philosophy that each sponsor has a one-to-one relationship with his sponsored child.

Discussions are currently in progress about potential changes to our gift policy; changes that would allow gifts to be made to a child from people other than the sponsor. And they’re positive discussions. But this topic isn’t just about philosophical issues, it also has logistical issues to overcome.

If we make changes to our gift policy we have to be careful about how we exercise the option to give to the families and children we read about on the blog.

As Vicki said, we want to be careful not to create dependency, which is the reason we have limits on the amount that you can give to your sponsored child as a birthday gift or family gift.

Originally Posted By Vicki Small
@Stacey
…while I appreciate the generous spirit that drives us all with regard to the children and families we serve, I think there’s a limit on how much we can appropriately do for one family, without either creating that dependency or assaulting a man’s dignity.

In case you’re curious, the distinction between giving to Kamrul and the help we provided to Alexander is that Alexander and his need for heart surgery was a specific medical need identified by his development center.

Many children have medical needs, but it’s up to church partner to identify needs that are beyond what our sponsorship program can address, needs that require specific assistance. This was done in Alexander’s case. A Complementary Intervention (CIV) proposal was submitted asking for funds to pay for his surgery.

CIV is the part of our holistic child development model that “complements” and augments our core programs in situations like disasters, medical needs, etc.

Child gifts and family gifts are a feature of the sponsorship program. They are governed by our gift policy which is meant to strengthen the sponsor/child relationship without creating dependence on part of the child or disparity among children in the sponsorship program. As a result, the gift limits are small in comparison to a medical need, like heart surgery, or a need in the wake of a disaster.

I do pray that Kamrul and his wife and children have accepted our Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior and I hope his step family will as well…may God guide and protect us all.

Besides…while I appreciate the generous spirit that drives us all with regard to the children and families we serve, I think there’s a limit on how much we can appropriately do for one family, without either creating that dependency or assaulting a man’s dignity.