The Iris Ministries Malawi Children’s Homes have been open since September 2005.  There are 87 precious children residing in our care with a wide range of ages.   We have established seven homes on the ministry base with 12 children in each.  Malawians serve as parents and care for the children in each home to keep the language and culture of the community.  We only accept children who are most desperate, meaning,
both parents have died and there are no relatives or neighbours able to care for them.   Our model nurtures family, rather than institution.  Each child has a valuable place in their ‘home’ and look to t heir caregivers as their new mother and father.  We don’t refer to the children as orphans, because they are no longer alone, but children adopted into a new family.  They are sons and daughters.

We would like to accommodate 100 children on the base.

We also support 60 orphans in the community by providing monthly food support, clothes, medical help, and for some, secondary school fees.  We now call this “Children of Hope”.

According to the Department of Social Welfare, there are over 40,000 orphaned or vulnerable children in our district that need help.   That’s a shocking number in a district with a population of only 250,000 people (2011).