North Carolina-based ZOE Ministry has helped more than 27,000 African orphans boost themselves out of poverty in the last five years. That’s according t0 ministry statistics.
Amanda Greene of Wilmington Faith and Values reports that one Wilmington filmmaker is traveling to Africa in August to document the ministry’s success.
Local filmmaker Curtis Thieman had never heard of ZOE Ministry before attending a Wilmington presentation about the group in the spring. ZOE, a North Carolina Methodist Conference ministry out of Clayton, uses a teach-a-man-to-fish approach to empower children orphaned by AIDS or genocide. ZOE hires African coordinators who gather the neediest orphans from villages in Kenya, Rwanda, Zambia and Zimbabwe and teaches them how to grow food to eat and sell.
Thieman says the ministry’s approach just makes sense to him, and he wants to help by documenting the stories of orphans in Rwanda and Kenya who are building thriving businesses through the program. Children plant, harvest and sell rice, sorghum, bananas and cassava.
Thieman leaves for Africa in early August.
Front Street Brewery is hosting a fundraiser for his trip at 6:30 p.m. Aug. 3 at 9 N. Front Street.
