Let's Hear it for the Boys!

Here’s a true confession for you: I always expected to be the mother of girls. I wanted girls. We were going to play Barbies and read Judy Blume books together. I was going to learn to French braid hair so my imaginary daughters would always look their best. Sugar and spice and all that jazz! Thankfully, God knew what I needed far better than I did. Boys. I needed sons and I got two of them, neither of whom is interested in having me braid his hair! I’m eternally grateful the decision was not up to me. But when you sponsor a child through Manna 4 Lempira, the decision is up to you.

You can scroll through their online albums for feeding centers (Mercedes Center and Betania Center) and look at a sea of precious faces waiting for someone special to sponsor them. If you look through those albums today, you will see a sea of boys staring back at you. Why? Because more people want to sponsor girls than boys. Waaaaaay more people want to sponsor girls than boys.

Now, no one is suggesting that sponsors don’t care about feeding little boys, too. Of course you do! Perhaps more people are sponsoring girls because we often hear about the plight of girls and women in developing countries. Perhaps it’s because you have daughters of your own and you want them to experience helping someone like them. Those are very good and valid reasons. And, of course, we want the girls to have sponsors. We simply want the boys to have sponsors, as well.

Currently, all of the children in several feeding centers have been registered. This is a problem across the board. Right now, the Manna 4 Lempira program has a backlog of FIFTY unsponsored boys. Yet, the Sowers are hustling to register the children in another feeding center because they are COMPLETELY OUT of unsponsored girls.

This is the sort of thing that makes Trish squirmy for fear someone will be offended by these statistics. If you are currently sponsoring a girl, or if you will sponsor a girl sometime in the future, THANK YOU! If you are considering sponsoring a child, whether it is your first or fifth, all we ask is that you prayerfully consider sponsoring a boy. Trust me, little boys like food, and shoes, and school supplies, too!

 - posted by Christi
 - pictures added by Trish
 - DISCLAIMER: the boys in the photos used in this post may not be the boys currently available for sponsorship!



Children currently available for sponsorship can be found at these two links:

Betania Program

Mercedes Program

Complete instructions, on how to sponsor a child, can be found here.