Jolleven, 11, likes to sing, dance and read. She is good at math and would like to become an engineer. Mayan has six siblings, and his parents grow corn. In the future, he dreams of being a police officer. 7-year-old Emelyn enjoys drawing and playing Filipino games - jackstone and patintiro. The dreams and favorite activities of children in the Philippines are no different from those of Polish children. The main difference, however, is in the ability to realize them...

In the heart of the Philippine village of Dansolihon, in a parish run by the Dehonian priests, children from poor, rural families are growing up in the shadow of deprivation. Parents are unable to provide their children with a uniform, school supplies or textbooks. Often even one full meal a day is a problem. The pandemic period has further widened the gap between the world of the poor and the reality of rich Filipinos.

That's why, together with Dehonian missionary Father Janusz Burzawa, we are running a project that brings real help. Each child participating in the program receives a bag of rice - 10 kilograms - every month. But there is one condition: they must go to school.

This way, there are no more excuses that the child did not go to class because he did not have anything to eat
- says Father Janusz.

Initially, the project included children whose parents died during Typhoon Sendong in December 2011. At the time, the cataclysm destroyed 9,000 homes and took the lives of 1,200 people. It was then that we, as the Secretariat for Foreign Missions of the Priests of the Sacred Heart, joined in rebuilding homes in the village of Our Lady of Mercy.

Although it has been a long time since these tragic events, we are constantly helping the most needy children and their families in the villages of Opol and Dansolihon. This group also includes children and families from the Higaonon tribe. Members of this tribe live a nomadic lifestyle, and their only source of income is growing crops on small plots of land.

Our nutrition and education project is a simple outreach, but it produces huge results. Anna Rose has nine siblings. Thanks to the project, she graduated from school and went on to study marketing and management. Today she works in government administration and helps her family and Father Janusz - to give more children, capable as she is, a chance for a better life.

The program works in cooperation with schools, but it doesn't stop with children. Parents also receive spiritual care and catechetical formation.