such as textbooks and meals. The need is great: Most people who live in Moto Village, a subsistence farming area, live below the universal poverty line of $1.90 a day. Moto Hope Mission began as a dream of Fr. Francis Kabiru, a friend of Baldwin’s who also serves as pastor at two parishes near Leech Lake: St. Agnes Catholic Church in Walker, and Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Hackensack. They met while Fr. Kabiru was a seminarian. After his ordination, Fr. Kabiru visited Baldwin’s in-laws in Florida, where they provide support to seminarians. During that visit, Fr. Kabiru and Baldwin toured area university campuses. The big, beautiful buildings prompted Fr. Kabiru to share his dream of building just When someone comes to the school … the one simple classroom in his Kenyan village. He envisioned an empowering educational very first thing they receive is hospitality. experience in his native Moto. With lots of prayers and hard work, the duo raised $1.7 million for a new education complex and began the successful nonprofit.
Photos by Steve Masimore, Rock Bass Photography
Today, St. Francis Moto Hope Mission includes St. Francis Academy’s 14 classrooms, electricity, a fully equipped community library, multi-purpose hall, 30 computers, a 400-bed hostel, a well that provides clean water, a school bus, a health facility and a micro-lending program that supports entrepreneurs who cannot access other lending. Baldwin came to Collegeville for her master of arts in pastoral ministry to bolster her understanding of Catholic social teaching and her pastoral skills. She says the impact of her SOT education is helping her bring Benedictine values to a new generation in Kenya. “We’re not officially dubbed ‘Benedictine,’ but the Benedictine values that attracted me to the SOT are instilled at St. Francis Academy,” Baldwin says. “They set us apart. When someone comes to the school in Kenya, just like coming to the SOT, the very first thing they receive is hospitality.” The warm, welcoming community combined with rigorous academics has made St. Francis Academy a destination for students across the region. Outreach continues to grow as does work in expanding resources for more students. Much support comes from the Minnesota communities Fr. Kabiru serves. After collecting books from Walker-area schools, Baldwin typically returns to Kenya with a 50-pound bag of donated books. The school library now has more than 10,000 books and is a prized resource in the region. The mission’s next goal, Baldwin says, is to expand support to increase the number of students who can live in the hostel and be “safe, dry and have three meals a day.” Baldwin draws from lessons learned at Saint John’s as she works to empower students at St. Francis Academy and others served at Moto Hope Mission. “The SOT helped me learn how to sit and listen to God’s call in my life,” she says. “I left the SOT with the confidence to say, I am a lay minister with the skills and knowledge to answer my call to do mission work in Africa.” Jessie Bazan is a master of divinity candidate at Saint John’s School of Theology and Seminary. Baldwin cataloging books at St. Francis Academy, an elementary school serving 332 students at the St. Francis Moto Hope Mission. The school library cataloging is done by hand and not online. Baldwin is co-founder of the mission and coordinator of its BeFriender Program. The non-profit is committed to educating and empowering children in the Moto region of Kenya.
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