Masese Beading Circle

Amazima Ministries is located outside of Jinja, Uganda and is the  baby of Katie Davis Majors. She originally founded the NGO when she first moved to Uganda to be a teacher for a year at the age of 18. She fell in love with the country and one thing lead to the next and she adopted 14 children, later adding a biological one of her own to that bundle. The ministry was originally focused on sending kids to school through a simple scholarship and sponsorship program. Since its founding days however, the ministry has taken on so much more. 1 thing specifically that sticks out is Masese Beading Circle

About 10 years ago, Katie found herself in a village north of Jiinja that was home to thousands of Karamojong, an extremely poor tribe from further north in the country. The village was full of people who had no jobs, food, homes, and motivation or ambition truthfully. Katie knew something had to change but she didn’t want to simply give away food. All that does is feed people temporarily and teach them to be reliant on others. Instead, Katie came up with the Masese Beading Circle.

The Bead Group consisted of 20 women from the village who were willing and able to work with Katie. It was simple. They made bracelets and necklaces our of paper. Katie then purchased them and shipped them to supporters in the US. What this did was it gave the women something to do and provided them with an income. Throughout this time, Katie began meeting with them and teaching them the bible. It was her way of pouring into a community one woman at a time.

If you would like to learn more about Katie and her mission, check out this book.