Citadel Ministries Mahajanga is a children's home on the north-west coast of Madagascar, led by Rachel Jane Wallace. From a family of fourteen children it reaches hundreds of the city's poorest families with food, medicine, schooling and the love of Jesus.
Citadel Ministries Mahajanga is home to fourteen children. Every one of them was placed with Rachel and her team by the children's judge in Mahajanga, because it was not safe for them to stay with their own family. No child stays overnight without the judge's permission.
The children live as a family: they go to school, are known and loved by name, and grow up with safe adults around them. Rachel is the home's chief director and Hoby Ralijaona is its co-director. Both sit on Mahajanga's local child-protection group.
Rachel was sent from Chiswick Christian Centre and trained under Heidi and Rolland Baker of Iris Ministries. It is our privilege, together with Pastors Phil and Caroline Whitehead, to have adopted her work.
Rachel approached Citadel Ministries to provide overall spiritual covering for her work in Madagascar. She also needed an NGO, and Citadel Ministries agreed to fulfil that obligation. To carry out her work in Madagascar, Rachel needs to be tied to a charity, and the NGO gives her permission to do so. The work runs in Madagascar as Citadel Ministries Mahajanga.
Chief director, Citadel Ministries Mahajanga
Rachel leads the children's home and every programme that runs from it, with co-director Hoby. She is responsible for the children's care and safeguarding, the weekly feeding programme, the community school and medical programmes, and the team on the ground.
The home is the centre of something much wider. These programmes serve families across Mahajanga every week.
Between 110 and 130 children come each Tuesday for rice and beans and clean water to drink. There are games, worship and a Bible story. Health talks teach hand-washing, tooth-brushing and not going off with strangers, and every family goes home with soap, a toothbrush and toothpaste. Many children take rice and beans home for their families. Wounds are cleaned and dressed, and the team prays for the sick.
Toys at Christmas, school books for the new year, yoghurt a few times a year, and something noisy for Independence Day.
Rice and beans, discipleship and practical help for single mothers, widows and grandmothers raising grandchildren whose parents have died or left. The aim is to keep families together. Alongside food the programme helps with clothing, schooling and medical needs.
When a doctor prescribes medicine a family cannot afford, the team buys it. Sometimes it costs as little as 30p, sometimes far more, but without it the medicine would go unbought. The programme is for children up to 18 and also helps many adults, and pays for operations, dental work, tests and, at times, clearing a family's hospital debt.
Every child in the home goes to school, and a community school programme runs alongside. It began in 2016 with 16 children. Last school year it helped 320 children, 20 of them at university. Many are the only person in their home who can read.
A constant stream of Bibles goes out from Mahajanga to believers all over Madagascar.
Every child in the home is there by order of the children's judge in Mahajanga. The local police visit every two years to check that everything is above board, and the government can inspect the home unannounced at any time, so it is kept ready for inspection every day. Rachel and Hoby both serve on the city's child-protection group. Read our own safeguarding commitment.
It could pay for any one of these
Costs in Mahajanga, from Rachel. Every gift goes to Rachel, who directs it where the need is greatest. Give to Madagascar
£20 buys the rice and beans for a whole Tuesday: up to 130 children fed, with food for many to carry home. £90 pays for the Christmas goat feast as the children celebrate the birth of Jesus.
Sponsor this£30 to £65 pays a community child's school fees for a year, depending on the school and their level. Last year 320 children were on the programme, 20 of them at university.
Sponsor thisPrescriptions, operations, dental work and tests for families who cannot pay, and clearing hospital debts.
Sponsor thisEvery gift marked for Madagascar is paid into the bank account of Citadel Ministries, a registered UK charity, and passed to Rachel Jane Wallace as soon as it arrives. Rachel directs how it is spent on the work in Mahajanga.
Nothing is deducted along the way: 100% of your gift reaches Madagascar. We will keep sharing regular updates on how funds are used.
"God put on my heart to buy 300 toothbrushes for the rubbish-dump community. When I got home, God told me to take 100 out and give them to the children at our feeding programme, which I did. The next day He told me to give another 100 to the poorest families we work with. After that I said to my Malagasy friend that the toothbrushes didn't look to have gone down, so we counted them. There were still 300."
Rachel Jane Wallace
Children from the feeding and community programmes are photographed with their parents' consent. Photographs of the children who live in the home are shared by Rachel, who is responsible for them, and are chosen to honour each child.
One-off or monthly. UK taxpayers can add Gift Aid. Questions about the work? Write to us and Rachel's team will answer.