Marafiki AIDS Orphans

Marafiki Global AIDS Ministry, Inc. was founded by Rev. John Mungai Nganga, D. Min; BCC; an Anglican priest from Kenya, Africa. Its primary mission is to assist children infected or affected by HIV/AIDS in Kenya, Africa. In 1989, while a priest in charge of Thika parish in Kenya, Rev. Nganga encountered his first AIDS patient. The patient was a young lady in the final stages of AIDS, dying alone in an isolated room at a local hospital. What he saw when he walked into that room devastated him. He was confronted with the horrific deterioration of the human body in the final stages of the disease. That sight touched his heart deeper than anything had ever touched him before. That experience forever changed his life. From that moment, Rev. Nganga vowed that, if given the chance to further his education, he would study Clinical Pastoral Care so he could enter into hospital ministry.

In 1991, the opportunity he had prayed for so long presented itself. Rev. Nganga secured a position in the United States where he earned a pair of Master Degrees and a Doctor of Ministry in Pastoral Supervision from United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio. In 1994, he was granted the position of Resident Chaplain at Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. He was delighted to discover the hospital’s HIV/AIDS Program. It was an answer to his prayers, thus, he immediately requested to be assigned there.

Soon after beginning work at Children’s Hospital, Columbus, Rev. Nganga founded Marafiki Global AIDS Ministry, Inc. “Marafiki” is a Swahili word meaning friend; a friend who is willing to love you unconditionally, irrespective of your color or religion, through your ups and downs, to lend a hand, to be there for you. Everyone needs such a friend, but to those in crisis it can mean the strength to meet each day with renewed hope. It is this type of friend that Reverend Nganga wanted to be to AIDS victims.

Thanks to a 1996 grant from The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Faith in Action Program, Children’s Hospital Foundation, The Columbus Foundation, and the Family AIDS Clinic and Educational Services, Marafiki was able to establish a volunteer-based program that served Central Ohio families infected and affected by HIV/AIDS. The overwhelming success of this program in Central Ohio prompted Rev. Nganga to begin a similar program in Kenya, Africa. The site selected was Nganga’s birthplace in Kikuyu, outside the city of Nairobi.

In September 1998, Rev. Nganga and a team of 11 volunteers made the first Mission trip to Kenya. The goal was to see, first hand, the effect AIDS has had on the country and to look for ways in which the ministry could be implemented there. The team saw, immediately, the effect the epidemic has had on the children. In Kikuyu Township, an area roughly the size of Ohio in the United States, the team gathered the names of nearly 320 children who had been orphaned by the deaths of their parents.

In 1999, five volunteers returned to Kenya determined to create a Children’s Center for AIDS orphans. It would be easy to say, “Leave it to the government,” but such social services do not exist in Kenya. There are no programs in place to support AIDS orphans, and the few area orphanages are filled to capacity. If there is no extended family or charitable neighbors, AIDS orphans live and die on the street.

Even for those children lucky enough to be “adopted” by a caring family, school usually is not an option because it costs too much.