Quechua Benefit
Quechua Benefit is an organization dedicated to helping the Quechua people in the highlands of Peru.
Watch this new video to find out how Casa Chapi received its name, and how the Chapel at Casa Chapi came to be. The beautiful stained glass windows will take your breath away. Many of the local people who enter the chapel for the first time are immediately brought to tears. A production of Voice4Nations.
The children of Casa Chapi have a song to sing for you! Wishing peace, joy, wonder and love to you and yours in this Christmas season.
Casa Chapi Children’s Village in the Colca Valley of southern Peru gets 100% of its energy from the sun. The Colca Valley gets about 330 days of sunshine a year. In October 2015, we installed a solar electric system to compliment the solar hot water heaters that were installed a few years before. These systems supply Casa Chapi with 100% of its energy needs, and we are proud that it’s entirely renewable!
These limited edition Christmas ornament sets were made by Peruvian artist Gualberto Mamani, who also designed and created the stained glass windows at Casa Chapi’s Maranatha Chapel. Each set comes in a beautiful wooden box and contains eight handmade ornaments. Bring a piece of Casa Chapi into your family’s holiday traditions!
Sue Regier, the Director of Casa Chapi, and Cassondra Puls of PASS, a Washington D.C. consulting firm, did in-depth interviews of Casa Chapi’s five teachers, four educational staff members, 63 students, and all of their parents. The interviews were conducted in-person at Casa Chapi over a 10-day period.
More than 10 years after our first mission, the board of Quechua Benefit decided to build a children’s boarding house, at 11,000 feet above sea level in the Colca Valley, so that the children could attend school in town. These students would be the neediest in the region, many of whom lived in high-risk households or too far away from any school to feasibly attend.
The donkeys hit their harnesses but the wagon would not move. More than a dozen men set their backs to the wagon, but still, it did not budge. Bent over from their effort and completely perplexed, the men in charge of the caravan suddenly heard a voice that seemed to emanate from the statue. It was crying, “Chaypi! Chaypi!”
Chloe Green, a high school student at Cascades Academy in Bend, Oregon, visited Casa Chapi in July 2016. This is her moving account of her experience of how Peru tested her limits, challenged her idea of “roughing it,” and made her feel strong.
What a lovely phrase, “the ministry of your presence.” I reflected on it often, especially during my time as a Peace Corps volunteer. The first goal of the Peace Corps is to provide technical assistance, but it can be frustrating work when nobody takes your advice, or even particularly wants it. The second goal, however, is simply to represent the U.S. to our host country, and that correlates nicely with a “ministry of your presence” philosophy.
The September 2016 issue of Alpaca Culture featured an article on the stained glass windows at Casa Chapi’s Maranatha Chapel. Read the full article, “Local Story Reflected in Stained Glass” by Meyla Bianco Johnston, here!
