Nigeria

Help Support Catholic Schools

Girls in Nigeria are particularly in need of education. In the Northern portion of the country literacy rates for women are often well below 50 percent. Education is simply too much for Nigeria’s poor to afford, especially a private Catholic school, providing a superior education and a firm faith foundation.

Sponsor a Child in Need

Our Ministry in Nigeria

Location

On the coast of West Africa, Nigeria claims the title of most populous country on the continent, and is home to more than 500 diverse ethnic groups. The country is split between top and bottom by a religious divide of Christians and Muslims. Its people have suffered from kidnapping and slaughter at the hands of the terrorist group Boko Haram, and was affected by the recent Ebola epidemic. Economically, Nigeria makes a substantial contribution to the production of chocolate in cocoa farming.

Ministry Partners

CARITAS For Children supports a partnership between the Diocese of Nsukka, Nigeria and the Chicago Catholic schools which began based on the professional and personal friendships rooted in the global mission of Catholic education between Cardinal Francis George, O.M.I. and then Bishop Francis Okobo of the Nsukka Diocese. These visionaries exchanged letters of agreement to establish this unique partnership of promoting Catholic education in September 2006 in a collaborative effort to establish a unified Catholic education school system for the Nsukka Diocese. This project involves the construction of new schools, pre-school through high school as well as a teacher training college, with the aim of fostering and maintaining Catholic education for the children of Nsukka. In 2010 CARITAS For Children established an agreement with the Chicago Catholic school system and we began our sponsorship program in Nigeria for the purpose of providing support to the families in Nsukka who could not pay for school fees or supplies on their own.