Tearfund

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Tearfund is a UK relief and development charity which works with local churches to work with people in poverty.

Tearfund funds and enables partner organisations around the world who work through and with local churches to bring justice and transform lives - overcoming global poverty. Tearfund works with its partners in advocacy, disaster prevention and response and community development. It is a member of the Disasters Emergency Committee.

Tearfund's ten-year vision is to see 50 million people released from material and spiritual poverty through a worldwide network of 100,000 local churches.

Contents

[edit] History

May 1959 - May 1960 was designated World Refugee Year by the United Nations. As a result, many evangelical christians in the UK sent donations to the Evangelical Alliance (EA) in order to help work with refugees. The EA set up the Evangelical Alliance Refugee fund to handle donations.

Donations to the fund increased, and in 1968 the decision was taken to go public under the leadership of the Rev. George Hoffman, a Church of England minister. The organisation was renamed The Evangelical Alliance Relief Fund (Tear Fund). The name no longer functions as an acronym, giving the current name Tearfund. Rev. Hoffman was awarded the Order of the British Empire (or "OBE") for his stewardship of Tearfund in its early years. In 1974 TEAR Fund financed Richard Adams to make a major purchase of handicrafts from women's organisations in Bangladesh. This led to the creation of Tearcraft and subsequently to Traidcraft. Both organisations have been instrumental in raising practical awareness about international trade and justice issues amongst UK Christians.

Similar, but independent, organisations have been founded in other countries. Tear Fund in Belgium was established in 1979. This has since been renamed Tearfund. Other Tear Funds have been established in the Netherlands, New Zealand, France, Switzerland and Australia (see below).

[edit] Campaigning

Tearfund, like many other NGOs, gets involved in campaigning - particularly to change things that they see as being causes of poverty. Tearfund is a member organisation of several coalitions, including:

[edit] Funding

In the UK, Tearfund receives most of its funding from Christians. It has an extensive network of volunteers who raise support. This is most likely because they only advertise in Christian papers and newsletters. In Belgium, Tearfund receives most of its funding from Christians related to the Evangelical Alliance.

[edit] TEAR Australia

The Australian Tear Fund was established in 1971. This has since been renamed TEAR Australia. TEAR Australia was the first organisation to launch a charity gift catalogue, called Arguably, the World's Most Useful Gift Catalogue which is now in its thirteenth year. The way in which the catalogue functions is that people are encouraged to apply funds that they would usually spend on birthday or Christmas gifts and the like, to items such as goats, wells, school equipment and training programs for people in poor communities in developing countries. The gift-giver receives a card to give the recipient of the gift which states that the goat or well has been provided in their name.

TEAR Australia uses the acronym Transformation, Empowerment, Advocacy and Relief. The organisation is heavily involved in developing educational materials designed to help Australian Christians respond to the needs of the world's poor. It is a member of the Micah Network, an international alliance of Christian relief and development non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

[edit] TEAR Fund New Zealand

See Tear Fund NZ

[edit] External links

[edit] In various countries

[edit] About Tearfund

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