It is just over two years since we arrived to work in Sierra Leone. Our contract is for a period of 
two years, and so we have extended it by just a few weeks to complete all the semester work at the Theological College, including attending graduation, marking of exams, and handing over of marks for the semester.
All of these will be finalised by 18 Dec, which is the date we leave Freetown, to have 5+ weeks of the local leave we have not taken ‘in-country’, in Spain. We will then return to Britain on 6 Feb, for 3 months of ‘furlough’ which includes a number of speaking engagements in various parts of the UK, during which time we will be living in the Pickering area of North Yorkshire. From the beginning of May, Peter will be involved in the Pickering circuit, and both of us will be doing some advocacy work for the Methodist World Church Relations in the York and Hull District. At the end of August, Peter officially ‘sits down’, a phrase used by the Methodist Church, referring to retirement. Janice has been receiving her pension for 6 years and so Peter joins her in receiving a similar monthly payment into our bank account, and to no longer be in financially remunerated employment!
During the last year, since we last wrote to you, there have been changes in some of the activities
that we are involved in. As a result of Daro sending us a UK newspaper article on the conditions in Freetown Central Prison, Peter has been engaged for most of this year with the prison’s inter-religious chaplaincy team. Just prior to our departure the work will conclude with a training day on the continuing development of chaplaincy work in general and on enabling a better understanding on the relationship between chaplaincy and the country’s Correction Services. As an example of mission, this has been a very, fulfilling time for Peter, not only working with the chaplains, but having discussions with the senior management of the prison services to explore how chaplaincy can assist in alleviating some of the effects of appalling conditions, as well as exploring the potential of incoming generating work by prisoners. The Methodist Relief and Development Fund offered a sum of money for humanitarian relief in Sierra Leone, and this has been distributed in the form of food aid to the families of prisoners living in the provinces, where food security is problem, especially during the ‘hungry season’.
We are now attached to the Wilberforce Circuit of the Methodist
Church Sierra Leone,(MCSL), a circuit that has excellent leadership, which is discovering more of its history and what it means to be part of a connexion. Both of us travel around the circuit six churches to lead worship service, and once a month Peter chairs the leaders’ meeting at the church in Goderich, a fishing village, which like many other places along the coast has a beautiful beach.
This newsletter was started the day before a group of four people 
from the British Methodist Church arrived, to join the Methodist Church Sierra Leone, as it celebrated 200 years of missionary engagement between Britain and Sierra Leone.
The Methodist Church is somewhat older than this, as the freed slaves, on their return to Africa, to what was then The Colony, to be later called Freetown, brought with them the various Christian traditions they had encountered in their places of bondage. So it was, that those who were Methodists, appealed to the Methodist Church in Britain to send them some helpers, and on 12 November 1811 Rev 
George Warren, Thomas Hirst, Jonathon Raynor, and John Healey stepped off the boat ‘The Traveller’ onto the shores of Sierra Leone. Peter has been the chair of the 
celebrations committee and during the last 8 months there has been various events including a lecture and a service to commemorate the four men leaving the shores of Liverpool. Warren Memorial Church was packed for the service of celebration, with the choir singing an anthem written by one of their members for 200th anniversary of the church, and identifying with some of their ancestors in the faith as the congregation left the church to the music of a hymn from the Caribbean.
Janice’s contact with the MCSL Support Group for people living with HIV continued during the year. The main work has been with the Literacy Facilitators and small community groups. The facilitators are waiting to hear whether they will be accredited by PADECO, the organisation that trained them in 2010, and also gave them a refresher course this year. The process of handing over the project to a small group is almost complete, with the new name of Family Literacy, realising that the improvement of parental literacy impacts on the life of a family.
As a result of the subjects that Janice has taught in the college, she is part of the staff group that observes students on teaching practice, in Junior Secondary Schools ie forms 1-3. The supervision has taken her to the Methodist Boys’ High School, and to three other secondary schools. All have classes of over 50 students, with a number of them not having sufficient seats 
for all the students to sit down. Tertiary and secondary school teachers have, at various times during the year, been on strike, due to not being paid on time, to lack of a pay increase and improvement in working conditions. The government has offered them a “package” but the motivation for quality teaching, which encourages student participation in the learning, understanding and application process is not very common. Students’ passivity, compliance and lack of interest are disturbing, as well as the teachers’ lack of confidence to do anything that make break this model.
As we prepare to leave Sierra Leone, we are grateful for the privilege of working here, and depart realising that anything that we have done is but a drop in the nearby Atlantic Ocean. The 
passages of slave trade era continue to have indelible marks on the nation we leave behind. Global poverty and the lack of employment for young people are compounded by a scarcity of clean water and electricity and the high maternal and infant mortality. In stark contrast, roads with cavernous holes support numerous four-wheel drive vehicles, and privately owned prestigious cars, that are parked on the drives of the luxurious houses being constructed at a rapid rate further up the hillsides of Freetown. With national elections due to take place in 2012, a vital step away from the recent history of conflict and civil war, we will watch in the hope that the time of preparation and voting will be one of peace. This will be significant in determining if the eventual outcome is accepted by both loser and winner. We pray that that those given responsibility will work honestly and with integrity. The hope of Africa is that the nation’s leadership will in turn enthuse the people to realise their own responsibility, to not just recognise the challenges that they face, but to be innovative, creative, and hardworking for a society that becomes more self reliant, and that each person realises their God - given full potential.
Advent Blessings
Janice and Peter
Contact details:
clark.janice@gmail.com and peterclark47@googlemail.com
(from 6.Feb.2012): c/o Rosemary Wass, The Green, Fadmoor, York YO627HD, U K
