Presbyterian Mission Agency This Child Here Archives

Faith of the heart

Posted October 23rd, 2024

In the sanctuary of avenue church nyc, Olya Balaban is unpacking small sandwich bags containing adjustable blue and yellow wrist bands — friendship bracelets in another vernacular — each adorned with a unique metal decoration. They are mementos brought from the Center for Creative Activities and Center for Sports in Izmail, Ukraine, supplementing a presentation by Balaban’s colleague, the Rev. Dr. Robert Gamble.

PC(USA)-related Menaul School receives six Ukrainian refugees

Posted September 11th, 2024

Menaul School, in cooperation with two global non-profit agencies, Spiritual Orphans Network (SON) and This Child Here, announced last month that the school has received six Ukrainian students as part of ongoing war relief efforts.

PC(USA) pastor brings stories from Ukraine to a U.S. audience

Posted July 23rd, 2024

In a presentation that featured a Zoom conversation with three people on the ground in Ukraine, the Rev. Dr. Robert Gamble, executive director of This Child Here, recently spoke on the topic “The Lamentations of Ukraine” with clergy and members of churches in Mid-Kentucky Presbytery. Gamble and others illustrated ways that This Child Here, a ministry validated by the Presbytery of Western North Carolina, works with families, mostly women and children, displaced by the war in Ukraine.

PC(USA) pastor brings stories from Ukraine to a US audience

Posted June 4th, 2024

In a presentation that featured a Zoom conversation with three people on the ground in Ukraine, the Rev. Dr. Robert Gamble, executive director of This Child Here, spoke on the topic “The Lamentations of Ukraine” with clergy and members of churches in Mid-Kentucky Presbytery last week.

Fanning out to aid Ukraine

Posted April 12th, 2022

On Monday, Avenue Church NYC welcomed the Rev. Robert Gamble, who does ministry in Ukraine validated by the Presbytery of Western North Carolina, for an extended visit throughout Holy Week.

‘You cannot love if your heart is not soft’

Posted April 10th, 2022

Alla Soroka is a 2017 International Peacemaker living and working in Odessa, Ukraine. She’s clearly devoted to her work with at-risk teenagers — even those who are beyond being considered at-risk and are incarcerated.

Ukrainian peacemaker devotes life to helping at-risk youth

Posted June 22nd, 2017

Although she never planned it as her life’s vocation, Alla Soroka has been actively working with at-risk children since 2005. She found her passion, and her trust in God, working with teenage prisoners, children and orphans living in the streets of her native Odessa, Ukraine. She will be sharing some of her experiences this fall (Sept. 22–Oct. 16) at Presbyterian churches, universities and theological institutions in the United States as a 2017 International Peacemaker.