Unemployed, single mother.

Everyone, children, and adults are severely malnourished. It is not enough to help them just once.

Sr. Ljilja is still in Venezuela, not resting. Despite COVID-19, which is also present among the inhabitants of Margarita (Venezuela), she cannot fail to see the ones in need or protect them as much as possible, with a mask and gloves, but the most painful thing is hunger. She notices the hunger all around and that is more dangerous than COVID-19.

Sister fights hunger regardless of the situation, does not shirk responsibility and does not consider the ones in need, as Pope Francis says, "ordinary recipients of aid." She brings concrete and real solutions, thanks to good people, friends of Zdenac who do not forget the neediest in these difficult times.

Visiting them, she encounters harsh life situations.

They have nothing to eat.

"I have a sister who has six children. The eldest child is 13. They have nothing to eat. I have four children myself. I can barely cope. I can't help my sister, and when I see all of them my soul hurts. One of the little ones doesn't grow at all. He loses calcium. Please, help my sister," Gustavo from Millanes told us.

Three weeks have passed since then. We had no food to include new children in the mission. In the meantime, help came from a group of Croats from Munich and several other readers of the Book portal. We procured groceries so we could distribute them to families and individuals who are in a situation like this.

I sent volunteer Amaury to visit Gustav’s sister and her family and investigate the situation.

It is a family of eight. Mother, Rosa, is 30 years old. She has four children from the first marriage and two from the second. She lives with a new partner, the father of the last two children.

The eldest son is 13 years old. He goes to the first grade of technical high school. Then there are two daughters who go to the 5th grade of primary school.

Gheosped Jesus is 8 years old. He goes to the 3rd grade of primary school. He is not evolving. He is even smaller than his 6-year-old brother. After Jesus come two more children, aged 6 and 2. They all live in one room.

The new "husband" deals with washing machine repairs. However, no one is fixing anything at this moment.

They live on social assistance, which is always low, on a "bolsa clap", a bag of groceries that the army provides once a month. At the time of the pandemic, the aid is reduced to 1 kg of rice, 1 kg of beans, 1 corn flour, a litre of oil. There are different foods in different places.

Near them lives another sister of Gustav. She has three small children. Two older ones have the same father who legally recognized them. The third one is from an unknown father and only has her last name.

They are in the same material situation as Rosa. Unemployed, single mother.

Everyone, children, and adults are severely malnourished. It is not enough to help them once. They need constant help with groceries so they can eat something for breakfast and dinner.

We will include them in the daily lunch. But that is not enough to survive. They should also eat at home.

There are many families like this one. At the time of coronavirus, many Venezuelan families returned to Venezuela on foot.

We have some more food to share from what we recently received. Based on that, we give what we get.

The food we share this time is rice, black beans, pasta, canned sardines, and canned tuna.

s. Ljilja Lončar the Missionary of Mercy

Let's keep the man in the centre. Let us not forget to put ourselves in the service of the poor.