Door of Faith
Orphanage
Back
to International History Menu
In 1959 Curtis and Sylvia
Freeze, an American Missionary couple, founded an orphanage at Rosarita
Beach, a village just south of Tijuana, Mexico. The orphanage is now located
at La Mision (not far from Rosarita Beach). In 1977, Papa Freeze died and
Von Freeze, the founders' son and his wife Agnes carried on with the work of
the founders until they retired and it is now managed by another American
couple, DJ and Lynette who now (Year 2003) have over 100 children in their care.
Note: Many of the children are not, strictly speaking, orphans, but rather
children of parents who are too poor to care for them.
Mission Viejo Rotary
The club members began visiting the
orphanage in 1988 and purchased a golf cart (see photos below) so that Agnes
and Von could have some form of transportation. In 1990, members brought
supplies, clothing and food on their visits along with doing
manual labor to fix up the site including painting, plumbing etc. Later in
the 1990's, members began an annual pilgrimage in December, bringing
Christmas presents and a visit from Santa. This was followed in 1997 when
then President Dr Richard Frieder OD
and his Lapaz Optometric Center included an annual Eye Examination of
the children and staff and provided eye glasses at no charge to those in
need.
Rotary Goods Bank has also played an
important part in helping to sustain the Door of Faith Orphanage by
supplying donated goods such as diapers, staples etc on a monthly basis. DJ
and Lynettedrive to our club's storage area each month and pick up the goods
set aside for the orphanage.
Shown below are photos (click on
the photos for a larger view).
Shown are Von and Agnes seated
in the cart and next photo shows our club members
handing over the keys.
The club has also supplied uniforms
for the Door of Faith children.
Photos below show the Eye Exams and Santa
giving gifts.
Year 2003
DJ & Lynette Schuetze, Administrators at the
Door of Faith Orphanage in Mexico visited us on
October 15th 2002
to thank our club and its members for all the
support including the Rotary Goods Bank (which they pick up goods for the
orphanage twice a month), our yearly Christmas visit and party and La Paz
Optometrict's eye examinations and free glasses.
DJ announced that " we’ve reached a kind of
turning point . For several years now, our goal has been to grow to where we
can effectively take care of one hundred children. We now have 103 kids
ranging from three weeks to 18 years. We are now considering opening a
second Door of Faith Orphanage to accomodate the many more who knock on our
door." DJ and Lynette consider this as their family and it is reflected in
their approach such as joining the children at all meals, giving each child
special tasks to promote resonsiblity and to hand out disciplne when
necessary.
Year 1999
Year 1994 Back
to InternationalHistoryMenu |
Rotary
Club of Mission Viejo
