Attitude toward missionaries

[cobraboy]

What I was referring to is the amount of $$$ the financiers have in play. I ~assume~ that the financiers have employees, bookkeeping, training programs, travel expenses, general overhead, living expenses, etc. Wouldn't surprise me if management lived a most comfortable lifestyle.

If they had, say, $200,000 cash in play with no defaults (I'm guessing a fairly high default rate) @ 2%, you're talking $4,000 a month, not big dollars even before any modest profitability was factored in.

I also assume micro loans are very, very small (I recall the average is around like $125 or thereabouts in India). That means that $200,000 creates 1600 loans, a massive administrative challenge (of course the average loan may be larger meaning fewer loans, but you get my drift).

So I don't see 24% as a huge, usurious rate (3.7%...meh). I doubt there is a lot of profit, but I do imagine the administrators live comfortably.

BTW-that 2% is around 90 pesos monthly interest. In terms of real money and purchasing power, that is not going to drive someone into bankruptcy. Seems to me it's more a loan with tuition attached than just a loan. And tuition costs.

Color me 100% True Blue supporter for micro-loan programs. That is teaching a man how to fish, instead of giving him a fish. People respond in their self interest when they have skin in the game, even if it's only a debt of $125.

[bob saunders]

CB agree with all you said but the default rate is very low less than 5% anyways. The stats say 97% repayment on time.

[Texas Bill]

Originally Posted by Funwhileserving

Wow!!! Thank you for all the great comments. I'm going to ask all the team members to read this thread. It's amazing that what you guys said is exactally what our team has been saying here.

We are coming. We realized what we're doing is a drop in the bucket. We take this seriously. Our first priority is to serve and not try to change the people.

Is there ever anything in this life that is clear cut? Everything in life is full of conflict and contradiction. We simply do our best, and we of faith pray for guidance.

Thanks again.

Funwhileserving;

Please TRY TO CONVINCE your SPONSERS to send you to HAIYI insteadof to the DR.
Show them PICHARDO'S Post, above and hammer home the idea that your team will not only be serving better in Haiti than in the DR, but that your efforts will be better received by the population.
We have already had entureky TOO MUCH interference into the society her by you "do-gooders" who comedown for a short period of time, undermine the efforts of the Dominicans to rid themselves of the illegal Haitians that are already here.
The problem is NOT ON THIS SIDE OF THE BORDER, but in Haiti itself andthat is where it MUST BE ADRESSED! NOT HERE!
If your sponsers insist on sending you to the DR to address the Haitian Problem, then they are doing nothing but a Public Relations scenario andare NOT REALLY interested in helping solve the problem at all.

That's it in a nutshell, young person, and if the shoe fits, wear it. Otherwise, throw it away and go where you can do the most good for those you aspire to render aid to.

Texas Bill

[Texas Bill]

Originally Posted by Thandie

Here we go again. This rude and snarky comment really irks me. Who says he is not doing both or helping people in his own backyard? Helping people in your own developed country and helping people in a developing country is possible. I do it. My friend who I volunteer with back in Toronto also came to the DR to volunteer with the Dream Project. It is possible you know. Why does it have to be all or nothing with some people? People have the right to help who they want, when they want and where they want, without judgement. Some of us dont have a boxed in view of our world but feel we are all connected.

I just dont understand people who feel that grown adults would need to justify why they do, what they do, with their own time and money and energy.

Thandie:

Did you EVER read the words "CHARITY BEGINS AT HOME"???
Maybe you should study that phrase just a bit and understand that there are SOME PEOPLE who don't think, nor act, as you do.
There is no reason whatsoever to belittle a person for a comment such as cobraboy made. To do so smacks heavily of a "holier than thou" attitude and we have enough people in this world who have just that atitude.
If a person has a different approach to what is considered by society to be "charity", who are you to deny them their opinion? Then to comment negatively about it on top of everything is the height of arrogance and self-rightiousness to boot.
Lighten up, you aren't the judge and jury of humanity.

Texas Bill

[Funwhileserving]

My goodness. Over 100 replies and OVER 3000 views???? Is this an interesting subject or what? Thank God for free speech and the interwebs.

[bob saunders]

Originally Posted by Funwhileserving

My goodness. Over 100 replies and OVER 3000 views???? Is this an interesting subject or what? Thank God for free speech and the interwebs.

Does your mission group do any work with Haitians in Haiti, or are the reasons you go to the DR that you can still help( and that makes you feel good), get a chance to have a working holiday (all work and no play isn't fun), still manage to have most of the creature comforts in a relatively safe environment? Not that it makes any difference to me where you go, but there is a reason Haitians come to the DR.

[Thandie]

Originally Posted by Texas Bill

Thandie:

Did you EVER read the words "CHARITY BEGINS AT HOME"???
Maybe you should study that phrase just a bit and understand that there are SOME PEOPLE who don't think, nor act, as you do.
There is no reason whatsoever to belittle a person for a comment such as cobraboy made. To do so smacks heavily of a "holier than thou" attitude and we have enough people in this world who have just that atitude.
If a person has a different approach to what is considered by society to be "charity", who are you to deny them their opinion? Then to comment negatively about it on top of everything is the height of arrogance and self-rightiousness to boot.
Lighten up, you aren't the judge and jury of humanity.

Texas Bill

Yes I am aware of the phrase and as the OP clearly stated he does help in his home country, and cobraboys negative comment implied that he did not.
His assumption was incorrect and that is why the posters angrily told him dont assume.
His comment (and I have seen others post the same comment in other threads) irks me (and thats why I challenged it...never denied anyones opinion, he freely shared his and I shared mine...and I never belittled him) because when people ask that rude question it suggests those volunteering outside their country dont help or care about the poor in their country or have a deep love for their home country. As if people should only help 'their own in theor own country'. And in my opinion that is a arrogant and self righteous.
Charity begins at home....but does not end at home!
And to the rest of your post umm, sure ok, whatever.

Back to the topic.

[PICHARDO]

Imagine if all this hearty outpouring of love and drive to aid the needed and hungry was aimed to Haitians IN Haiti!!! The needs would be satiated within a few short years and their need to migrate under severe hardships to other lands would be completely erased...

If only all this honest and well meaning work was aimed properly, maybe the DR's poverty imports would actually allow the POOR DOMINICANS to elevate their living standards and get wages that would allow a family of 3 to actually live at above dirt poor levels.

Imagine POOR DOMINICANS being able to toil in the construction, services, hospitality, manufacturing sectors while earning the amounts that allows them to have real hope of a better future today!

Only imagine if instead of creating a relief valve for Haiti's never-ending poverty and hunger cycle, by supporting the very same people that seek that aid in the Dominican Republic, all these angels aimed their might there for a change!

Maybe the never-ending lines of the poorest to ever walk the face of the earth, would instead stay home and little by little create a real country able to support their dreams and hopes, just like the Dominicans did, without ANY help from all these angels by sheer self determination and love for our children's future to be better than ours.

Maybe, just maybe could Haitians begin to see the light at the end of the never ending misery tunnel, the one that always seems to shrink ever so smaller and just let a faint ray of hope shimmering....

Until then, why not visit the DR and aid those hungry and destitute folks in a country that still owns a vast number of needed that may not be dropping dead like flies from hunger, but are not invisible or less human b/c they can afford an extra piece of bread or clothe than the foreigners that sought to ease their pains here as well.

Each mouth you fed and lifted from the large number there, multiplied by ten as others seek the same aid, on the backs of our hungry and poor which are not as destitute as those that came but not more fortunate than those you seek to aid in their own home.

This is not about uncaring about the poor or hungry, but where the actions to assist and aid those that need our help and hand, are in fact causing more damages to others that are not in any better position themselves in the first place.

Would you hunt a hare to feed a family on the south of your yard, from the yard on your north that barely supports the family there?

You aid is 100% honorable, humane, a pure act of compassion, love, caring and all those very good things that we humans are capable of sometimes. But, just sit and THINK that this aid is being offered at the right people in the wrong place; at the cost of more misery upon million others than can't possibly take on the extra load, once your aid packs and go home. And yet the needy remain here and even grow to more numbers that we must deal with, at the cost of our own invisible people to the aid groups.

The DR has limited public care, limited state funded programs to aid the poor and needy. What do your think happens as budges get cuts b/c of economic downturns and these same services are now called upon to take care of extra needy each month than before?

Each time you assist an illegal population from next door in our country, you're fomenting their families to come as well to our country by huge numbers.

Go to the source of the problem and famine if your aid is to really be done without hurting millions of others that shouldn't be made to pay for it.

If you really want to aid the Haitian people, do so without hurting MY PEOPLE!

AND YES YOU READ RIGHT!

Each time you aid ONE single illegal alien in the DR, you're hurting the resources that our public funded programs and services provide to our poor by creating a larger mass of illegal seeking refuge and to satiate their hunger in the DR.

I wouldn't be any more than elated if all aid programs by groups like yours are taken off from the DR and aimed instead to the Haitian people IN Haiti. That would mean that our poor would be taken care of and their standard of living addressed, with our limited resources as they may be, but just like it has been done BY OUR PEOPLE since 1844...

Each time you feed or clothe one illegal Haitian in the DR, you do so at the cost of hundreds or more poor Dominicans that must later see their public and privately funded services and programs shared by even more people that are left behind those do gooders that leave once their "work of love" is done and pack home.

What do you think happens when the medicines you packed so neatly and distributed among them is finished? So the group you serve under contacts a courier to make sure it never runs out there? The clothes you give outlast their normal human growth/wear? What do you thin happens? The resources of the public funded care programs are taxed to limits as this poor little country without the monster GDP of Canada or the USA, provides FREE care to the uninsured with the little there is available; which to begin with, is the result of having to provide care to untold number of non-nationals. At the expense of all other POOR DOMINICANS.

Haitian nationals are never denied care or aid from ANY public funded services to the poor in the DR!!!!! What do you think the untold number of extra illegal is doing to those services?

Why they come in the first place?

Please, pretty please! The next time you want to join a "loving" cause, investigate the impact this aid may cause to those "INVISIBLE" people that are replaced by the critical needs of the ones you seek to aid.

There's a right place and time to do everything. You have a very good heart, good intentions but are making a huge mistake by actually feeding more a problem that affects millions of people that are being pushed aside along their own needs, in their own soil.

No matter how you cut or slice this one, as horribly it truly sounds, you're causing more hurt than the help you think you're doing.

Go to Haiti if you really want to help the Haitian people. If you want to help Dominicans you're more than welcome to do so, in our towns and pueblitos and citizens. Don't hurt our poor citizens even more by coming to their own soil and aiding those that are taking away the very aid YOU or your groups DON'T provide for them, but our own people with our own money.

Don't slap their faces anymore by doing this you call a "labor of love" in our country...

[klickster]

Wow... my first response, after following this thread for over 10 pages, is that you sure like to go "off-topic" a lot.

first let me say a word to those that oppose "evangelizing, well digging and Bible distribution."

Well drilling is truly a great work... you are "teaching to fish" and not "feeding them a meal." Think of all the man-hours that were previously spent procuring water that can now be used to do something productive like work... sure, these man-hours can also be used to smoke dope, but that doesn't make you responsible if the recipients of these wells turn to crack... you gave them water, not drugs, right?

Now to the root of this question, you must realize that free speech is designed to work equally for everyone. You dont often see people "forcing" their religion on people. Maybe in "cult" compounds, but not in mountain villages with new "missionary-dug" wells. And in no way does the well obligate people to read the Bible.

With that said, I'm sure there are plenty of people (both the evangelizing well diggers, and recipients of these wells and Bibles) who will stand firmly on the belief that they are doing more good and are helping people more with their Bibles then they are doing with the wells. They are entitled to this opinion, and as long as we remain a free society where people have free speech, (would you really want to take this away?) they will continue to have the right to share their beliefs with others.

Nals,
perhaps you dont understand economics. While the illegal immigrants are bad for the country, the so-called mission efforts to help them are nothing but healthy for the Dominican economy. They come here. From each plane ticket that is bought, about $300 of that is taxes... taxes that go toward paving your roads, feeding your poor, buying bikes and trinkets on 3 kings day, and mostly, taxes that are miss-appropriated by Dominican officials. This is neither the fault of the visiting "missionary" (tourist) or the fault of the illegal immigrants, so if your country is struggling, you should really take this up with your botella government and not with the tourists who inadvertently help to pay their salarios.

And keep in mind that there are about as many Dominican immigrants in the US mooching off of the system there as there are illegals here mooching off of the Dominican system. Most of these Dominican illegals are better cared for then your Haitians, send more money home to the D.R. then the Haitians send back to Haiti, and yes, both are a problem for their host country.

Finally, if you would like to go to Haiti and help the Haitians there, you are welcome to...
And if you do, you will see while you are there that there is far more of a white missionary concentration there in Haiti then there is in Jarabacoa.

If "charity from rich white people" was the main deciding factor when the Haitian decides where to reside, they would most likely all stay in Haiti, since there are far more foreigners there to mooch off from. The Haitians are here (for the most part) to work, and I firmly believe that unless both the Dominican and the American people decide that they would like to work and do these jobs themselves, they both really should make legal immigration an easier and less expensive process. The cost of legal working immigration, both to the U.S. and to here from Haiti, is higher then the working class can afford; this is the primary cause of the immigration problem, and its something that can only be fixed through better legislation.

[Chip]

Originally Posted by klickster

Wow... my first response, after following this thread for over 10 pages, is that you sure like to go "off-topic" a lot.

first let me say a word to those that oppose "evangelizing, well digging and Bible distribution."

Well drilling is truly a great work... you are "teaching to fish" and not "feeding them a meal." Think of all the man-hours that were previously spent procuring water that can now be used to do something productive like work... sure, these man-hours can also be used to smoke dope, but that doesn't make you responsible if the recipients of these wells turn to crack... you gave them water, not drugs, right?

Now to the root of this question, you must realize that free speech is designed to work equally for everyone. You dont often see people "forcing" their religion on people. Maybe in "cult" compounds, but not in mountain villages with new "missionary-dug" wells. And in no way does the well obligate people to read the Bible.

With that said, I'm sure there are plenty of people (both the evangelizing well diggers, and recipients of these wells and Bibles) who will stand firmly on the belief that they are doing more good and are helping people more with their Bibles then they are doing with the wells. They are entitled to this opinion, and as long as we remain a free society where people have free speech, (would you really want to take this away?) they will continue to have the right to share their beliefs with others.

Nals,
perhaps you dont understand economics. While the illegal immigrants are bad for the country, the so-called mission efforts to help them are nothing but healthy for the Dominican economy. They come here. From each plane ticket that is bought, about $300 of that is taxes... taxes that go toward paving your roads, feeding your poor, buying bikes and trinkets on 3 kings day, and mostly, taxes that are miss-appropriated by Dominican officials. This is neither the fault of the visiting "missionary" (tourist) or the fault of the illegal immigrants, so if your country is struggling, you should really take this up with your botella government and not with the tourists who inadvertently help to pay their salarios.

And keep in mind that there are about as many Dominican immigrants in the US mooching off of the system there as there are illegals here mooching off of the Dominican system. Most of these Dominican illegals are better cared for then your Haitians, send more money home to the D.R. then the Haitians send back to Haiti, and yes, both are a problem for their host country.

Finally, if you would like to go to Haiti and help the Haitians there, you are welcome to...
And if you do, you will see while you are there that there is far more of a white missionary concentration there in Haiti then there is in Jarabacoa.

If "charity from rich white people" was the main deciding factor when the Haitian decides where to reside, they would most likely all stay in Haiti, since there are far more foreigners there to mooch off from. The Haitians are here (for the most part) to work, and I firmly believe that unless both the Dominican and the American people decide that they would like to work and do these jobs themselves, they both really should make legal immigration an easier and less expensive process. The cost of legal working immigration, both to the U.S. and to here from Haiti, is higher then the working class can afford; this is the primary cause of the immigration problem, and its something that can only be fixed through better legislation.

nice response and overall good points.