A FRIEND OF AFRICA
Rafiki Foundation’s Rosemary Jensen Dedicates her Life to Africa’s Youth.
Written by Blair Townley; Photos by Anthony Rao
Africa: It’s a continent an ocean away from the United States and probably a world away in several people’s minds, especially during the Christmas season.
Africa and its people are never far from the mind of Rosemary Jensen of Umatilla, especially after seeing firsthand how their lives have been affected by the deadly disease AIDS. 
The former director of the nationally-recognized Bible Study Fellowship, Rosemary turned her concern for Africa into the Christian-based Rafiki Foundation that has provided 529 orphaned children with shelter and education.
“We teach Christian classical education to our children,” Rosemary says. “I’m concerned not only about their care but also about their education and certainly for their spiritual lives.”
Currently located in 10 African countries, the Rafiki Foundation also teaches children business skills that assist with income needs as they get older.
“The children love it there at the villages and they know the alternatives also are pretty grim if they weren’t there,” Rosemary says. “Many of them would not be alive.”
The “villages” she speaks of are the Rafiki Villages, housing where children live with local volunteers and are provided with child care, education and medical amenities. Inside the villages are the schools, infirmary, dining halls, play field and 12 cottages with four residence halls.
Ten children live in each of the cottages, arriving between the ages of 18 months to 5 years, with one African mother trained in child development and Christian principles. The 1,400-square foot cottages include two bedrooms with two sets of bunk beds, a family room and additional bedrooms for the mother and for two more children.
As the children get older, between ages 10 to 12, they are moved into residence halls accompanied by a married couple that become the “mother” and “father” of the children.
Rosemary looks back to the start of creating the first Rafiki village in Ghana in 2001 and recalls feeling overwhelmed by the undertaking.
“I will tell you I was blown away with the privilege of doing this but I had a total sense of inadequacy because I’ve never run an orphanage. I just knew that I had to do it because I couldn’t ‘not’ do it. The money had been provided, I had been asked to do it, God had given to me the strength and I love what I was doing already,” Rosemary says with a heartwarming smile.
Rosemary and the staff of Rafiki Foundation made a new home themselves in Eustis last year with the construction of their first-ever headquarters.
The headquarters are located on 57 acres donated anonymously and gives visitors a glimpse of the actual layout of the villages with replicated buildings that house the administration and training offices.
People can also stop at the Exchange store inside the headquarters to purchase items made from students in Rafiki’s Vocational Arts program.
You can become involved as well by financially supporting an African orphan, taking a short-term missionary trip to Africa or volunteering at the headquarters.
At 80, Rosemary Jensen is doing God’s purpose for her life. The same purpose could be yours as well, helping others a world away.
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