AMECEA PLENARY: Missio Invest Urges Release of Funds to Help People
By Mwenya Mukuka
Missio Invest says funds that are in the Church’s investment accounts need to be used for the good of the people.
Patrick Mujuni who is Missio Invest Country Investment Manager for Tanzania said this on behalf Fr. Andrew Small, OMI, who is President and CEO of the organization.
This was during Missio Invest solidarity message to the ongoing AMECEA bishops’ plenary assembly in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
“Whether they [funds] are in Rome or in Germany or in the United States or even in Africa, resources that were intended for the poor and marginalized must be used for that purpose now,” Fr. Small said.
Father Small further explained that Missio Invest helps the mission Church boost any income-generating activity by providing the skills and the financial resources necessary.
He however noted that Missio Invest does not just transfer resources from the North to the South as many aid agencies, but that, the radical concept behind Missio Invest is to transfer the risks that people bear and share them other people in other regions.
“The moral measure of any common effort is the ability of each member to bear what he is able to bear. And for too long, the Church in Africa has been asked to fulfill a mission without the necessary funds while bearing all the risks involved in highly developmental projects,” He said.
Father Small further said that the development is a generational injustice that needs to be corrected.
“This is a generational injustice that needs to be corrected and Missio Invest represents a whole new way of conceiving our relationships so that they are based on a spirit of mutuality between equals,” Father Small told Bishops.
And Father Small said the Church is called to be the beacon and light of God’s saving presence, however, it can do nothing if there are no religious personnel, no structures, no seminarians or novices, no schools or clinics or day centers.
“God’s hopes and desires for us and his plans for salvation will ultimately be frustrated and come to nothing if there is no Church. That is the goal that Missio Invest aims to achieve,” he observed.
Founded to provide a mechanism of sustainable financing for those diocese under the jurisdiction of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, Missio Invest was launched at the AMECEA meeting in Malawi in 2014 and now operates in 10 countries with over $10 million invested in more than 50 projects.
50% of the loans are used sustainable agriculture projects but it has also started lending to schools and hospitals including financial institutions.
So far it has recorded a 99% repayment rate.
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