International Abstinence Program

In October of 2007, Angie and Monica spent over a week in Ukraine where they were able to teach the Guard Your Heart abstinence program to children and teenagers in two government operated orphanages there as well as instructing others on how to teach abstinence programs. Angie and Monica became the first Americans to go to Ukraine and with the permission of the government to teach an abstinence program.

"Their government allowed us to go into their orphanages and teach, which is a big success," Angie said.

In addition to working with the children there, the two also instructed church and community groups, as well as a group of Nigerian medical students on how to teach the abstinence program so that they can teach the program to others. Angie also spoke about the abstinence program to a group of doctors, nurses, social workers and health officials.

In addition to their work on helping to get abstinence education programs started, Angie and Monica also worked with a community group that was attempting to get a crisis pregnancy center started in their community.

"We gave them some advice on what they could do with their crisis pregnancy program and the kinds of programs and services they could offer," Monica said.

Angie and Monica also visited children’s and adult hospitals where they provided supplies. They also took supplies to a missionary family there who helped them coordinate their trip with the Ukrainian government and local officials.

Mike Guinn organized the travel part of the trip for Angie and Monica and connected them with Bruce MacDonald and his family. Bruce is a missionary from Chattanooga who is currently serving in Ukraine. While in Ukraine, Angie and Monica stayed with a host family.

Angie and Monica were accompanied on the trip by Monica’s father, David Jackson, who attended two pastoral conferences in Ukraine and also spoke at some of the churches there.

Angie stated that she is hoping to be able to coordinate another trip over there in 2008 to lend more assistance to groups wanting to start abstinence programs and crisis pregnancy centers in Ukraine. She said that getting a crisis pregnancy center started there will be very important because Ukraine currently has a negative birth rate (9 births per 1,000 versus 16 deaths per 1,000) due to the high number of abortions that are occurring there.