The Academy is Tribuna!

Check out the article on The Academy and Pathways Danbury Youth Ministries in La Tribuna, which is published in English, Spanish and Portguese.

http://tribunainenglish.com/news/education/overcoming-boyhood-challenges-to-become-men-of-honor/

Introducing Community Reconciliation

Jericho’s mission to “transform the city of Danbury for the glory of God and the common good of its people” has been founded on five objectives:

  1. Increase the number of Danbury youth embracing a biblical worldview.
  2. Increase the graduation rate of at-risk youth, while developing young men and women of honor
  3. Foster the sanctity of life on a whole-life basis
  4. Offer the transforming hope of Christ to adults struggling to overcome homelessness, addictions and mental illness
  5. Advance the physical, emotional and spiritual transformation of Danbury neighborhoods

Now, in part as a response to our nation’s general spirit of disharmony, Jericho’s Board of Directors has endorsed a new, sixth objective:

6. Reconcile all the people of Danbury to God and to each other by living the gospel of Christ and by Jericho Church Partners being closely connected to each other and to the city of Danbury, united in breaking down barriers that separate us from God and from each other.

Shawn Fisher: A Life Transformed

Shawn Fisher said he had his “a-ha moment and wow moment” at once – while lying in a nursing home bed, looking down at the tubes protruding from his torso, which were doing for him what his ravaged body couldn’t do. Keep him alive.

Decades of unbridled alcohol abuse caught up with Shawn one day in March 2016, when his advanced pancreatitis triggered a stroke. Over the next days, while his family prayed fervently, his bodily systems would begin to shut down, one by one, and doctors told everyone to prepare for the worst.

Five Unexpected Benefits of Volunteering

We know that volunteering to serve others –  at Jericho, we call it “being the hands and feet of Jesus” – is a blessing to those who receive your time, compassion and love.

But what about the volunteer? Recent research has determined that there are some surprising benefits to the person sharing his or her time with others.

Here are five unexpected benefits of volunteering:

Nobel Winner Leymah Gbowee Visits Jericho

It’s not every day a Nobel Peace Prize winner comes to your front door.  Saturday at Jericho wasn’t “every day.” So when Leymah Gbowee came to Jericho Partnership to hear about our ministry to the city, it was truly a moment to remember.

Leymah was in Danbury as the keynote speaker at Peace Jam, a weekend conference at which middle and high-school students learn the value of social action by hearing from Nobel Laureates. As part of the this year’s conference, hosted by Western Connecticut State University, students had an opportunity to engage in various service projects around the city – including at three of Jericho’s ministry sites.

Leymah, who led a non-violent movement to help end the civil war in her native Liberia and was honored with the Nobel prize in 2011, interacted with the students who were at Jericho – painting, cleaning, and organizing. She also sat down with Jericho President Carrie Amos, who shared the many ways that Jericho serves some of the neediest people in Danbury.

Before taking Leymah on a tour of our building, Carrie was able to bring Jericho’s ministry to life by sharing the story of Jericho’s mural, which hangs in our Rose Street lobby.

More than 100 students descending on three sites where Jericho operates its ministries every day of the week: Spring Street Neighborhood Center, South Street Elementary School, and its headquarters at 13 Rose Street.

At Spring Street,  Peace Jammers prepared sandwiches and care kits for local homeless shelters, and cleaned our facility.

At South Street School – where Jericho volunteers serve as Reading Buddies through CityServe – students painted and assembled supply bags on which they wrote encouraging notes.

And at Rose Street, students cleaned, painted and organized a storage room….where they were excited to get some assistance from Leymah herself.

“This was amazing,” Carrie said. “Leymah is just a world-changer. “What she has done for a country we are trying to do for this little city. This is our first year (with Peace Jam), and I suspect it will be the first of many.”