Ministry focuses to help fund church buildings

A local ministry in Kanga village, Kokoda, Northern Province, is using its own funds to bring development to villages and rural communities in the country.
The National caught up with spokesperson Peter Pari and five of his members from the Partners in Mission Ministry during their recent visit to Port Moresby.
Pari said the focus of the ministry was to help fund and build church buildings in areas where basic government services were minimal.
“Partners in Mission Ministry falls under the Anglican Church in Kokoda under the Saga church and our main focus is seed planting ministry,” Pari said.
“The ministry is not made up of Anglicans only but is an inter-denominational.
“We help people in the rural areas that do not have a proper church building. We have done this in Northern and now the Port Moresby diocese.”
Pari said they came to Port Moresby to buy building materials to construct a church for locals at Sori village in Kerema, Gulf.
Sori village is under the care of the Port Moresby diocese through Bishop Denny Guka.
Pari said the team made their first visit to Sori village in Oct last year to begin early works. Early last month, a team of six members led by leader Noel Boeba returned to Sori village to complete the church building.
The building was competed on April 14.
According to Pari, the Partners in Mission Ministry began in 1990 and current Anglican priest Fr Grayson Elea was a pioneer member of it. Elea is now priest in-charge of the Holy Family Anglican Church in Hohola, Port Moresby.
“In the year 2000, we started to focus on seed planting, especially in funding the construction of church buildings, maintenance and even supporting pastors financially in their work,” Pari said.
“We are not formally employed but the money that God blesses us with, we use to help others to extend the Kingdom of God.
“We also help other churches.”
The Ministry has about 16 members who are closely supported by the Kokoda community.
“This group is not an Anglican diocese youth group but is a parish youth group; our vision is to reach out of the boundary to others,” Pari said. He said the ministry received its funding from small scale gold mining activities in the village.
“We have assisted communities and we have seen how God blessed us in return. That is why we give without hesitation,” he said.
“We do not wait for people to assist us. We just move and make sure our projects are done.”
Pari said they had recently assisted churches in Gona, Musa and Tufi, in Northern with materials to build their local church.
He said they assist the local community based on the need the ministry identified or from requests they received.
The team is planning to assist the Anglican community at Moreguina, in Abau, Central.