The children are safe from this pandemic. The children are meeting the challenges of this pandemic. The children will be prepared when this pandemic ends.
When this 40th year began we thought it would be non-stop celebrations at the Children’s Village, in our town and parish in Zaragoza, all over El Salvador, and among supporters in North America.
Instead, the children and staff have been quarantined on the COAR Children’s Village campus since mid-March. The housemothers work “double-shifts”, eight days on and eight days off, allowing for a short isolation period to detect symptoms before starting work. The other staff who work daily wear facemasks at all times and stay distant from the children and their contact-staff. But the most selfless dedication to the children’s well-being through this pandemic is our Director, Marta, who has stayed quarantined with the children for almost the entire past seven months.
She joins a long line of Directors: Maria Isaua, Incarnate Word Sisters Santaga, Mary Pat, Lelia, Ann Mary, Rosa, Audrey, to our first director, Fr. Ken Myers. All of them dedicated years of their lives to keeping the children safe through war, the ravages of gang violence, and grinding poverty. But they also enriched their lives through education, counselling, the games and play of childhood, and love, simply, love. That is why our children will be prepared for the world after this pandemic ends. Thank you for making COAR a beacon of love and hope for 40 years.
