Charity

Restore a Child and the Palm Springs SDA Church in Florida presented a cheque to the West Jamaica Conference to keep rebuilding an Adventist church destroyed by Hurricane Melissa, as mission teams returned to help children and families.

Sunrise Community Church’s Hands On Ministry joined the charity ARK and local firms to repair a West Bay home with live wires, a leaking roof and standing water inside, for single mother of two Tina Ebanks-Jackson.

Sunrise Community Church’s Hands On Ministry joined the charity ARK and local firms to repair a West Bay home with live wires, a leaking roof and standing water inside, for single mother of two Tina Ebanks-Jackson.

Sister Mary Susan Frazer, area administrator of the Sisters of Mercy in Jamaica, has died. She was known for the extensive development of the St John Bosco Vocational Training Centre in Hatfield, Manchester, and her work with Alpha in Kingston.

The Salvation Army is selling its Grade B-listed Aberdeen Citadel for £475,000 after flood damage from heavy rain in February 2026 forced the 1896 landmark to close, saying the building no longer meets its needs.

The Kingston Hub Disaster Relief Project, run by the Anglican Kingston Deanery and the District Grand Lodge of Jamaica, handed over mattresses and supplies at Christ Church and said $2 million had been donated for house repairs in western Jamaica.

The former board of the Mavis Fraser-Davis Trust, closed in 2021, gave its remaining J$2.6 million to St Albans Anglican and Bethlehem Moravian churches in Malvern, St Elizabeth, to help students affected by Hurricane Melissa.

A now-defunct educator’s trust made its final distribution: $2.6 million split between two St Elizabeth churches, arriving during a period when many congregations have struggled to access government post-Melissa funding.

VM Group and Food For The Poor handed a two-bedroom home in Myersville, St Elizabeth, to Novia Russell, a single mother caring for children, a niece and her elderly mother, after Hurricane Melissa hit the family.

Faith Apostolic Ministries used Mother Lewis AME Church in Petersfield, Westmoreland, as a medical and distribution centre for more than 100 Hurricane Melissa survivors, with nearly 80 volunteers bringing food, clothing and health care to Shrewsbury and Logwood.

Nearly 200 Welsh chapels and churches have closed since 2015, with 300 more predicted, and the National Churches Trust’s Cherish project is giving grants such as £30,000 to reopen a chapel in Aberdare.

A transitional hostel for 19 young men living with or affected by HIV is complete at Mustard Seed Communities’ Matthew 25:40 Boys’ Home in Kingston, after the Kiwanis Club of North St Andrew raised more than $25 million.

Two New Testament Church of God congregations ran Mission Rise 3.0 in St Elizabeth after Hurricane Melissa, repairing three badly damaged homes and bringing medical, dental and legal help, even as the Middle Quarters church itself lost its roof.

Jamaica’s Adventist leaders denied receiving government money for Hurricane Melissa relief, detailing a J$500,000 pre-storm reserve, a $35 million conference outlay on supplies and overseas donations, as about 150 of their own churches were damaged.

A month after Hurricane Melissa, Food For The Poor committed US$5 million to repair and rebuild Jamaican homes, funding hundreds of roof-repair kits and introducing a concrete-strengthened wood-frame ‘FFTP Hybrid’ house for families who lost everything.