Enlarging the Borders

The new Home, with its ever increasing numbers, was soon as overcrowded as when they started in the first little cottage in Santa Fe. She speaks of this in a later report of the work.

Having to carry on the school work in the same building that we started in at Los Pinos, and housing the boys and girls in the same house, brought many problems, and we began praying that the dear Lord would again let us enlarge our borders so we could better care for the ones we had, and also take in more. The house stands near the front and to one side of the land, leaving the rest open for future buildings. The house now accommodates fifty children and eight adults who labor with them.

At the present time, we have the girls upstairs with the lady workers, while the boys occupy the downstairs with the two men teachers. But we cannot long keep girls and boys in the same building. So our plans are to build dormitories for the boys on the other end of the land and to build the school in the center where all may attend the same day school.

We also plan to have in the school building a large chapel room where daily worship and also Sunday School and services will be carried on. We hope by God’s help and yours to build room for one hundred boys and to enlarge this present building to accommodate one hundred girls. And the natural growth of the work will soon make it necessary to have a nursery building where the babies may have proper care without interruption to the rest of the work.

When we think of the greatness of this work, all it involves, human nature would naturally shrink, but we have made a natural decision that Satan can have no part in this, for has he not held full sway long enough? Now God has stepped in and has stretched out His hand to deliver, and He is calling His people to save this situation and to make possible the saving of many Cuban children.

God answered the petitions to enlarge our borders, and in 1945, we built an addition to the Home, or rather built an adjoining house to be used for the office of the Home and of the general mission work, and for living quarters for some of the workers. This building cost around ten thousand and proved to be a blessing as well as a necessity to the work.

The next year, in 1946, they were able to purchase the property next door to the present home. There was a roomy residence and four acres of fine ground, all in good condition. Alterations were made, and three large rooms were added. The total cost was $13,500. A wall was built around the new place for the protection of the girls. This wall cost over $2,000. The total cost of the property was at that time $38,000, for she says at this time:

Our family for the past year has numbered over seventy children. I am now speaking of children definitely made over to the homes. We have also sheltered many others for poor families when the mother had to be taken into a hospital, or when some difficult circumstance forced itself upon parents, and they needed a helping hand until they could again get their family together.

Grade school was begun as soon as the mission was started, and in 1946, some of the Educational Board of Havana showed us favor, and from that time they have supplied good teachers for us.

The girls are housed in the newly purchased property and the boys in the main building.

She was indeed grateful to the Board of Education for the wonderful help and looks forward to using more teachers some day. From the very beginning they had planned to have a vocational school, as it would be a better preparation for these children. The Director of Education and the Inspector of Schools in the district were both agreed with her on this matter, that such a school would be more profitable than the regular course of work that is generally followed in grade and high schools.

As soon, therefore, as the children were advanced, a special plan was to be laid for these schools so every child would have the opportunity of preparing for practical usefulness in whatever line they are inclined to follow. It was a real pleasure to see the way some of these children put their hand to work, after having been there such a short time.

Much of the sewing, laundry work, and cooking is done by some of the older children. They have, as mentioned before, half-day classwork, and the rest of the day devoted to activities on the place. One hour in the afternoon is given for those who want to study English. In the future, some kind of factory work will be planned for those who will need it.

The object is to give each child a chance to become a useful citizen and also to fill a better place in the work of the Church. Much of the suffering among the poor in Cuba is caused by so many of her youth being unprepared to go out and fill the useful places in life.

One of the greatest responsibilities in this work is to plant the eternal Word of truth in the minds and hearts of the children. As they grow up and develop in life, it must be so firmly planted that they will not depart from it. One must labor for the physical, moral, and spiritual welfare of the children, but most of all for the spiritual. Every nation, Cuba included, needs noble men and women with a real conception of the plan of God and a deep conception of His truth that will enable them to fill an honorable place.

Many of the children have been cowed down under the cruel circumstances which have bound them, and they come to the homes under a spirit of fear. Here the caregivers strive to keep away from the homes the cold institutional atmosphere that makes a child feel as if he or she were but a machine, and to make a real home for them. Thus, under loving care, the fear disappears, and they live with the happy freedom of normal childhood. Some, of course, have grown hard and bold and fearless through cruel circumstances, but have mellowed through the influence of the Gospel and the kindness shown them.

Once a mother came bringing three ragged, thin, sickly girls. She presented a note she had brought from an official in Marianao, stating that this poor woman had been sleeping with her children in doorways of houses for a long time and had been begging in the streets for their daily food in the daytime. It was impossible for her to find work and care for her three children. There was no place where she could leave them.

The Home took in the three children and gave the mother some much needed clothes. Today she is working for a good family. The children are doing well and getting along nicely in school.

There was a notice in the city paper of a despairing mother with three little boys, starving, and appealing to the police for help. One of the Mission workers rushed to the place, located the police station, secured the information needed, and called on the mother. The little boys were half dead with starvation. They were admitted to the Home, but she was so poor in health that she could not hold a place. She was given work she could do in the Home and proved to be a blessing. She loves the Word of God, and she truly thanks God for the opportunity to live and be saved. You who are laboring with us, together we labor, together we water the seed with our tears and prayers while we look forward to the great harvest of ingathering. Then together we will carry our sheaves (souls from Cuba) and lay them at His blessed feet.

It was around this time that we learned of Francisco, who was a soldier and was ordered to take three prisoners to the prison and deliver them personally. The whole affair was indeed unjust, as he had to be responsible for all three, and if any one escaped, he would have to serve out the sentence of the escaped man. On the journey, one of the men broke away and escaped entirely, and after he had delivered the other two, he himself was sentenced to several years in prison to serve out the sentence of the escapee. What a sad time to that home! The wife came to the Homes and presented her story and asked that she might leave the boy in the Home and go out to seek work.

When they found out the sad story, everyone in the Home was deeply touched and went to earnest prayer and kept holding on that God would show mercy to that innocent man and free him out of the hands of the law which was so unjust. After a few months, to the great astonishment of the man, God began to work, and though it was hitherto an unheard of thing, the man was freed.

He has always been grateful. And the Home has no better friend than Francisco. In times of special need, he is always to be counted on, and even at this late date, is helping out here at the Home.