After visits in November and February, Jean-Claude Souillot returned to Haiti in June 2010.  He needed to have a feel for the new situation and to see how we can best deal with it and be of help to the men there. He found Port-au-Prince to have changed dramatically since the earthquake.  Everywhere there are collapsed buildings and rubble, much of which will still contain dead bodies. 

There are tents erected in every available space, even down the central reservation of one of the main roads, and this is where the majority of people are living.  They are still too frightened to live inside the remaining buildings.  Only 1% of the promised aid has reached Haiti as yet, and the massive amount of clearing and rebuilding work to be done is overwhelming.  The presidential palace was destroyed, with many of the government officials inside, so there is hardly any government in operation. Amidst all this, life goes on as usual.  Jean-Claude was able to meet up with most of the students in Port-au-Prince who are active on the Cours de Formation Continue preacher’s training course.  Most of them have lost their homes, but the believers do not complain about their situation.  One example is Jean-David, who is living with his wife and six children in a tiny tent, with his widowed sister and her four children in a similar tent next-door.  Jean-Claude was able to pass some gifts directly to some of the men, to help them. 

Plans had already been set in motion before the earthquake to co-ordinate the Cours de Formation Continue Preachers’ Training Course for the Haiti students in the Co-Ordination Emmaus bookshop in Delmas 31, Port-au-Prince, and in the goodness of the Lord, despite all the buildings around being reduced to rubble, the bookshop is still standing and is once again in operation. The postal system is practically non-existent (the main Post Office is now 3 slabs of concrete), so Jean-Claude put everything to do with the course on to a laptop computer which he left at the bookshop, so students can now come to the bookshop to download their next lessons, including the audio elements which they put on to their mp3 players.  The new secretary there seems very efficient and able to help the students with this.  Everything needs to be fine-tuned, but at least it is all there in operation. The Emmaus bookshop has already received many of our Europresse books, and despite the earthquake, was able to sell a very large number of these between January and May. They were therefore able to pay Jean-Claude back some of the proceeds, which paid for all his Haiti travel expenses, plus extra.  This was totally unexpected over such a traumatic period.  Jean-Claude was able to spend three afternoons in the bookshop and saw a constant stream of customers.  We are considering sending another large consignment of Europresse books in the autumn.  There is a great need for good reformed literature.

During his stay, Jean-Claude had many opportunities to preach, sometimes several times a day.  ‘Religion’ is rampant, but the people are totally unused to preaching totally based on the Bible and we pray that this will be a challenge to them.  The students themselves need to be fired with the vision of preaching a Christ-centred gospel, and of being witnesses and also agents for the books around Haiti.   Jean-Claude hopes to return to Haiti before too long, and possibly visit some of the out-lying towns such as Jean-Rabel and Port-de Paix, where some of our students live, but travel around Haiti is still very difficult and dangerous.