Two years after a powerful tsunami devastated a dozen countries in south Asia, Virginia Baptists continue to minister to its victims in India.  We encourage you to share this information with your congregation as the two-year anniversary of the tsunami approaches and to invite them to participate in the ongoing tsunami relief ministries. 

On December 26, 2004 a massive earthquake beneath the seafloor off the west coast of the Indonesian island of Sumatra generated a tsunami that raced undetected across the Indian Ocean’s surface.  When the waves reached shallow coastlines throughout south Asia, the tsunami built into a wall of water, inundating coastal communities, destroying houses and property, and claiming as many as 250,000 lives.

As the world struggled to comprehend the scope of the devastation, Virginia Baptists began formulating plans for responding to the disaster.  Because of its long-standing relationship with the seminary of the India Baptist Convention, the Virginia Baptist Mission Board (VBMB) decided to focus its tsunami relief efforts in the southern Indian states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

Along the southern coast of India, as elsewhere, the tsunami struck without warning.  As the first wave surged inland, a young mother grabbed her two daughters and fled for the safety of a nearby coconut tree.  They clung to the tree, but the next wave swept the mother away.  The terrified girls held on until the force of the water overpowered the younger one, and she too was carried away by the sea.  The tsunami lasted less than seven minutes.  When the waters receded, rescuers found the older daughter still clinging to the coconut tree.  She assumed that both her mother and sister had been killed, but several days later the younger girl was located, miraculously alive, and joyfully reunited with her sister.

Dr. Kunjumon Chacko, president of the India Baptist Convention and chairman of the Precious Children project, an Indian organization that runs homes for children whose parents are in prison, realized that someone would need to care for these two girls and for the thousands of other children who had been orphaned by the tsunami.  In Kerala, Precious Children already had an orphanage in the village of Kottayam, adjacent to the India Baptist Theological Seminary. But this home was full, and Chacko envisioned building a new Children’s Village to house and educate children orphaned by the tsunami.  Today, Virginia Baptist gifts are helping to make Chacko’s dream a reality.  Construction has begun on three cottages, estimated to be completed in 2007.  When the entire complex of five cottages is finished, the Children’s Village in Kottayam will house 300 children.

Until the Children’s Village opens, local pastors and other volunteers have opened their homes to house children orphaned by the tsunami.  Some of the money given by Virginia Baptists has been used to cover the daily living expenses of these children.  Beginning in 2007, Virginia Baptists will have the opportunity to sponsor individual children for $400 per year.

In Tamil Nadu, the tsunami devastated the coastal village of Kolachel (alternate spelling: Colachel).  A marble monument now marks a mass grave where hundreds of villagers killed in the tsunami are buried. Thousands more were left homeless.  The waters also destroyed the village’s only Baptist church.  With funding from Virginia Baptists, the Kolachel Baptist Church has now been rebuilt.  In February 2006, a large crowd packed the church when representatives from the VBMB attended a service to dedicate the new building.

In Kolachel, Virginia Baptists saw an opportunity not only to help rebuild the church, but also to restore the villagers’ livelihood by providing fishing boats, motors, and nets.  With Virginia Baptist donations, Dr. Chacko employed a second-generation boat builder named Soris Anbu Austin, a Christian, to construct fifteen fiberglass fishing boats for about $10,000 each.  Each boat can provide enough food to sustain five crew members and their families.  Austin was so impressed that fellow Christians in Virginia desired to help the fishermen of his village that he renamed his factory “The Jesus Boat Company,” placed a cross on the bow of each boat, and stenciled “Virginia Baptist” and the boat number on each one.  When a team from the Virginia Baptist Mission Board traveled to Kolachel in February of 2006 to distribute titles to the last of the fifteen boats, they noticed another boat bearing the inscription “Virginia Baptist 16.”  In response to their inquiry about its origin, Austin replied that the sixteenth boat was his personal contribution to the fleet.

Families who had lost all of their belongings in the tsunami could not comply with Indian government regulations that require children to wear uniforms to school.  To address this need, a team of Virginia Baptists traveled to India in June 2005 to distribute uniforms to 2000 school children. In addition, each student was given a school bag containing pens, paper, books, sandals, and an umbrella.  On each bag was the reminder: “God loves you; so do Virginia Baptists.”  The VBMB team that returned to India in February 2006 brought a second uniform and additional school supplies for these children.

All of these tsunami relief projects in south India have been made possible through the generosity of Virginia Baptists.  In November 2006, Baptist World Aid of the Baptist World Alliance also contributed $100,000 for the Children’s Village project.  To date, the BGAV has received more than $790,000 for tsunami relief, the bulk of which has been distributed by the VBMB. 

Soon after the 2004 tsunami struck, Virginia Baptists began reaching out to meet the needs of its victims in Kerala and Tamil Nadu, India.  Reflecting on these ministries after a trip to the region this past February, John Upton, Executive Director of the VBMB, observed that “Virginia Baptists’ fingerprints are all over south India.”  They can be seen on the new Kolachel Baptist Church, on the bags that were given to school children, and on the fleet of fishing boats that now ply the waters off India’s southern tip.  They are impressed upon the walls of the Children’s Village that is rising from a banana tree field in Kottayam.  Through these and other ongoing projects, Virginia Baptists continue to touch the lives of tsunami victims in south India.

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