Women Full of Life, Joy, and Inspiring Hope

From February 25 to 28, 2025, I conducted several supervision visits to the field activities of the African Jesuit AIDS Network (AJAN), including the “Building Resilience in Women and Young Girls in Africa (BRWGA)” project. This initiative, supported by the Canadian Jesuits International, deserves my sincere gratitude. The project is implemented at St. Ignatius Center by the Christian Life Community (CLC) of St. Ignatius in Kinshasa, within St. Kizito Parish in Kingabwa, located in the western part of Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo. This support has enabled AJAN to fulfill one of its core missions: “Investing in young women to uplift and build families, the foundation of human society.”

From ignorance to a life as proud and hopeful tailors.

My first visit to this hidden corner of the great megalopolis of Kinshasa, whose population is estimated at nearly 17 million (Kinshasa Population 2025), was a shocking experience, given the misery in which the people live. Paradoxically, there is an atmosphere of joy, resilience and intense commercial activity. Meeting the women and girls accompanied by the CLC St Ignace, I felt a sense of consolation, encouragement and thanksgiving.

One of my sources of joy and consolation in meeting the young girls who are beneficiaries of the ‘Building Resilience in Women and Girls in Africa (BRWGA)’ project was the great joy that was evident on their faces. I saw in their eyes young girls full of life, satisfaction, optimism and hope. Girls who were proud of what they had become. Their joy was genuine and natural; it was a contagious joy that quickly spread through me! Thanks to AJAN’s financial support, 20 young girls and one young boy, among them HIV-positive, who six months earlier were illiterate, are now able to write, read, calculate and sew clothes of various models! It’s wonderful to see such a rapid transformation! In my opinion, it’s a minor miracle! With little means and little will, miracles can happen. They were all dressed in self-made uniforms.

Another source of consolation came when they presented me with their words of gratitude. One of them, Miss Milca Nkazi, reached up, opened a folder and took out a text written in French, and in a confident voice she began to read. The moving message read in part:

“We were young girls and boys who had been abandoned, neglected and even abandoned, wandering around with nothing to do and no hope because of a lack of financial resources, but thanks to AJAN we’ve got a smile back on our faces and we’re now useful to society. After six months of training, we are happy to say that we have benefited from a wealth of knowledge on civic, moral and Christian education, literacy and French. It wasn’t easy, because not all the conditions were there (lack of certain materials, insufficient sewing machines, the defection of the learning room, etc.) but despite that we achieved our objective thanks to the team of very generous and gifted trainers who supervised and trained us to make us what we are today. We now know how to read, write, calculate and sew clothes… The action you have taken goes hand in hand with the word of God which says: ‘I was hungry, you gave me food; I was thirsty, you gave me drink; I was naked, you clothed me… (Mt.25,34-40). For our part, we say: we were useless, abandoned, sad… you gave us back our smiles and you made us men and women useful to society.”

Another moment of consolation and gratitude for me was hearing the words of the team of trainers. It was a word that conveyed their sense of satisfaction. The team emphasized that they had worked with conscientious, hard-working and enthusiastic girls and men who were willing to learn. These young people are their pride and joy,’ they said. Mrs Tshilomba Régine, Head of the Centre de Formation et Promotion Féminine (CFPF St Kizito), said: ‘After six months of training in cutting and sewing, we are proud to present you with a team of seamstresses capable of representing us everywhere’; and she went on to say that ‘despite the difficulties they encountered, they held firm and today the Chinese proverb: “If you give me a fish today I’ll eat and tomorrow I’ll be hungry; if you teach me to fish I’ll never go hungry again” has come true’.

In addition to the young people who were introduced to sewing and other human values and skills, around thirty adult women, including HIV-positive women, received financial support to strengthen their income-generating activities. Their testimonies are rich and encouraging. With the help of CLC, they have become one family: they share their experiences to ensure that they adhere to the antiretroviral treatment, they visit each other and support those who are more weakened by the disease in their homes. In addition, for greater sustainability, they have set up a fund to which everyone contributes according to their income. To date, they have saved the equivalent in Congolese francs of around USD 750. This fund is used to support members of the group in difficulty and to strengthen the activities of those in need. My congratulations to them and their mentors, especially Dr. Anne Marie Ibrahim, Mr. Remy Ngamba and Paul Mwense!

Remy Ngamba, Director of the St. Ignace Mission Centre in Kingabwa, is very grateful for the training on sustainable project management and many other topics that he and other AJAN Network members have received. For him, AJAN’s work has enabled them to organize their aid to vulnerable people more sustainably and effectively. He said:

“Before, we used to collect donations and distribute them to beneficiaries, then go out and find others to distribute, and so on. Now, thanks to the training we’ve received from the AJAN team, we know how to think about and plan for sustainability, and how to monitor the impact of our actions. These courses have opened our minds. For example, the ‘joint savings fund’ that the beneficiaries have started to build up from their profits will be redistributed to boost and empower new, well-targeted beneficiaries, and to support orphaned children and other sick members without necessarily waiting for outside intervention. Many thanks to AJAN and its benefactors, who have enabled us to open our eyes and change the way we help others. We now do it with a different mindset.”

I am convinced that no individual, no community can develop in isolation. In other words, no one on this earth can say that he is self-sufficient; we always need the support of others if we are to progress in our lives. My gratitude goes to the members of the CLC St. Ignace for this ministry of consolation that they carry out in this very underprivileged area of Kinshasa; many thanks to Father Blaise Evagle (member of the C.I.C.M. congregation), parish priest of St. Kizito parish for his involvement, my gratitude and encouragement to the members of the CLC St. Ignace. My gratitude and encouragement to all these young people who have understood that grace always comes with personal effort and who are learning to take responsibility for themselves in order to build a more fraternal world and, consequently, a generation of young people without poverty, a generation worthy of trust, autonomous and a sign of hope.

The needs are immense but the means very limited. May God accompany the initiatives of these young girls and women and encourage more generosity on their behalf.

Success Stories

Mrs. Antoinette, sundries saleswoman

I had the opportunity to talk to one of the beneficiaries of the project, Mrs Antoinette. She has started a small business with three trays of eggs received from CLC in 2023 through Jesuit Father Michel Lobunda (Chaplain of CLC St. Ignace). With this help and the support she has received from AJAN, she has been able to diversify her products (juices, water, eggs, groundnuts, etc.). To date, thanks be to God, she has managed to buy 2 motorbikes which she uses as taxis in the town. She employs two young people for this service and is very proud of them. Mrs Antoinette is very grateful to AJAN and CLC for their unconditional support and guidance. For her, it is a great mark of love and generosity. She is blesses and prays for all those who support AJAN, through whom she and her fellow women have gained access to the aid that makes them valuable women today’.
However, she underlined her concern at the suspension of the distribution of ARV drugs. She explained that ‘the doctor at the hospital where she gets her ARVs has announced that in a month’s time they will have nothing left in stock’.

This situation is as a result of the suspension of USAID aid. In her group, 23 women will be directly affected by this suspension. This situation exacerbates the suffering of the most vulnerable and increases the risk of losing the gains already made in AIDS treatment and prevention.

Mrs N’simba, bread seller

I also met Mrs N’simba, the bread seller. She started with 4 tubs of baguette bread, each containing 40 pieces. In 2 years her business has grown and today she sells 30 tubs of 40 pieces of different types of bread. She’s delighted because her profits are gradually increasing. At weekends alone, she is able to save around US$30, the equivalent in Congolese francs. With that, she says with a smile, ‘I no longer lack enough to feed my children and provide for my daughters’. She gives thanks to God for life, which led to her encounter with CLC. She is very grateful for the support and guidance she received from CLC and AJAN. Her prayer and wish is that other women will also have access to the same help and guidance from AJAN, so that fewer of their children will become bandits or prostitutes because of poverty, and others will fail to go to school because of a lack of financial resources.

By, Fr. Ismael Matambura SJ.,

AJAN Director.