Pangaro and Empower Tanzania

Read about the Pare Diocese Jubilee.

On the way to Arusha and safari, we visited the Maasai village of Pangaro. 

Like all Maasai villages, Pangaro is on the plains, which are warmer and drier than the mountains of Kirangare. The Pare people of Kirangare are crop farmers. Those who also keep cows or goats have just a couple. The Maasai, on the other hand, are herders, keeping flocks of sheep, goats, and cattle.

We went to Pangaro because in 2017, Pastor Sara visited Pangaro. On that trip eight years ago, she traveled with her mom, Pastor Elaine, and women from St. Paul Lutheran Church in Davenport, through Empower Tanzania. Based in Same, Empower Tanzania works in partnership with rural Tanzanians to improve their quality of life. In 2017, they had just completed a well in Pangaro serving 1,200 people. Before this, the women and children of Pangaro had to walk nearly 20 miles every other day to collect water. Sara wanted to see the well again and, even more, see the people of Pangaro again.

When we arrived, some 100 Maasai of Pangaro welcomed us with singing and dancing and many handshakes. They ushered us into their church building. They are Christians in Pangaro, part of the Lutheran Church in Tanzania, just like Kirangare Parish. There were introductions before the choir sang and, boy, did they sing! I was thinking, “This is the best choir I've ever heard in Tanzania” – which is saying something because all the choirs are amazing! While they sang, a man danced beautifully.

After singing, they told us Pangaro’s choir had been called “The Bishop's Choir,” because they were the Bishop of Mwanga Diocese's favorite choir. But since the bishop was tragically killed in a car accident (while we were visiting last September), they're now called “Upendo Choir” – upendo means love. They have recorded many songs and produced music videos too, thanks to the departed bishop's patronage. And I'm an act of extravagant generosity, they gave us all these recordings and videos on a flash drive! After exchanging gifts, the Upendo Choir sang again, then the children's choir. 

After lunch, we visited the well, which was a short walk away from the church building. There, donkeys waited to transport the water jugs that women and children were filling with a hose from the well. Pangaro leaders explained that, a few months ago, an elephant trampled and damaged the wellhead. Since then, they dug a dry moat and surrounded that with a brush fence. The wellhead has not been repaired – too expressive for them – but the well still functions.

When we left Pangaro, we also said goodbye to two Empower Tanzania staff members who had led us to the village – Elibariki “Eli” Kisimbo, country director, and Joseph Johnson Kimbwereza, agriculture and livestock director. Earlier Eli hosted us for breakfast in his home outside Same, with his wife and younger daughter. There, we discussed the possibility of Empower Tanzania bringing one of its low-cost, high-impact education programs to Kirangare.

The “Most Vulnerable Children” program would offer the poorest Kirangare school-age children Saturday English instruction and financial support for school fees, uniforms, and supplies. The Zion Daycare – the expansion of which Zion is even now funding – already gives the poorest preschool-aged children a headstart. This Empower Tanzania program would pick up where the Zion Daycare leaves off, supporting the same kids as they start and advance through school. 

“Start with empowering kids,” Eli said.

The “Most Vulnerable Children” program already operates in two other locations, including in Same and in Vudee, the latter in partnership with Redeemer Lutheran Church in Indianola. In fact, a few beneficiaries of the program in Same travel to enroll in Kirangare Secondary School. Even now, Simon Simon teaches them. He says they are some of his best students. And of course, it was the Cow Project that enabled Simon Simon to go to school. He does what we would call youth ministry at Mpare preaching point. And as a teacher, he earns an income that allows him to support his Mpare family financially. Like the Cow Project and the Zion Daycare, bringing the “Most Vulnerable Children” program to Kirangare would change lives, families, the church, and the whole community.

Eli asked if St. Paul would sponsor the program. So when she returns, Sara will work on those arrangements. What a difference this program would make for our siblings in Christ! And what a blessing for Zion and Kirangare Parish to partner with Empower Tanzania and St. Paul!

By the way, Empower Tanzania grew from the companionship between our synod and the Pare Diocese. They work in five program areas:

• Education - serving the most vulnerable children
• Public health - partnering with the Tanzanian government to train and provide stipends to 105 community health educators and their assistants
• Agriculture and Livestock - teaching sustainable farming and providing goats, sheep, chicken
• Environment - planting trees
• Water - building gravitational and drilled wells and training and supporting local well workers, in partnership with Engineers without Borders 

Empower Tanzania’s executive director, Todd Byerly, is a member of St. Paul. Joseph and Pastor Clark visited Empower Tanzania’s Same office in 2022.