Grace Center Foundation

About This Project

When Marcie Erickson was just 19 years old she felt a calling from God to fulfill his will as stated in James 1:27, “Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is to visit orphans and widows in their affliction.” She prayed and decided that yes, one “ordinary” person who listened to God could do extraordinary things through Him, and she co-founded Grace Center.

In Ethiopia, thousands of children are living on the streets, simply because they have neither home nor family to care for them. In addition, there are thousands of families living in destitute poverty, unable to provide enough food for their whole family; numerous babies are abandoned each year, relatives are left with the care of children whose parents have died, and children face a life of hardship and neglect. Many women are alone with their children escaping abuse, servitude or poverty, lacking the traditional generational family support that has been stripped away by war, drought, famine and disease of the past 50 years.

When a family needs to care for their children in difficult situations, there are very few options outside of Grace Center. Many mothers feel they have no opportunity to raise their children when they do not have work, training or sufficient food to feed themselves. Therefore, they abandon or relinquish their children in the hope of something better for their children at least. Without Grace Center, a family in need of childcare for any duration has nowhere to turn.

We turn away no one who is truly in need and provide the following programs: daycare, foster care, K-4 schooling (soon to be K-12,) after-school programs, feeding programs, support for those needing medical care and housing, special needs programs, prison kids ministry, women’s empowerment and small business training.

Grace Center fed thousands of civil-war refugees this year, provided medical and housing assistance to those who needed it and rescued over 30 boys who fled their villages to escape terrorists wanting to use them as human shields. We work to reunite these children with their parents or any surviving family members in their villages.

Grace Center receives many abandoned babies and children. We find them on the roadsides, in bus terminals, left at our gate, or at the hospital when a mother disappears after giving birth. The reasons are many that desperate women see no other solution but to abandon their babies or small children.

Why give to this project?

We seek to give these families hope and provide the relief they need to keep their children and lessen the chances they will fall victim to child traffickers. This year we are implementing a first-of-its-kind program in Ethiopia a country-wide crisis hotline to provide services for women and families who might otherwise abandon their children.

Will you partner with Grace Center? Together we are the “ordinary” people who work to transform the lives of those whom we may never meet in this world but will one day meet in heaven.