Lay Missionary Leads Social Work For Local Church

Posted: 22nd June 2004

Bernadette Glisse, Belgian lay missionary, with a patient

SIEM REAP, Cambodia - One foreign woman crisscrossing Cambodia's Siem Reap province is not hunting down ancient temples but rushing from village to village to manage Catholic-run projects for the local people. Bernadette Glisse, a Belgian lay missionary, has been a catalyst of social change in the area since 1995, when she settled in Siem Reap town, 230 kilometers northwest of Phnom Penh. According to Timothe Masson, a French volunteer who assists Glisse, the 54-year-old woman is always "on the run" from one village to another, tending to the many social and health-care projects she heads.

As founder and coordinator of Caritas Siem Reap, Glisse supervises all the projects herself. Masson and a team of about 20 Cambodians assist her. Caritas Siem Reap is Battambang prefecture's relief and social development agency. Siem Reap province, in the heart of Cambodia's rice-growing region, is famous for the ruins of the Angkor Wat temple complex. When Glisse, a nurse, first came to the area in 1995, she was shocked by the unsanitary conditions in floating villages on the Tonle Sap, the largest lake in Southeast Asia. She quickly built a health center in Chong Knies village, and Caritas Siem Reap was born.

The consecrated lay missioner went on to help establish health centers in Kok Dong, Peak Sneng, Kantreang, Bantey Srei, Rum Chuk and Po Menchey. These centers, some built by Caritas and others by the local government, have treated more than 80,000 people. they all were eventually handed to the government, but Caritas provides financial assistance and technical support.

In 2002, the provincial government cited the center in Kantreang as the best health center in Siem Reap. The one in Kok Dong was also awarded, for its role in treating people with tuberculosis. The year before, Glisse, who is fluent in Khmer, started a program to address the root causes of health problems. She organized a team that travels from village to village to create awareness about health issues and to distribute mosquito nets. Her team has also provided nutritional support to about 3,600 children under five and 700 pregnant or lactating mothers.

Also in 2001, Glisse launched an AIDS program through which Caritas staff have provided at-home counseling and medical services to more than 300 patients. Masson explained that the program is home-based because Glisse believes it is better for people to be among their family members when they are sick or dying. He said HIV/AIDS affects 3 percent of Cambodians.

Apart from health issues, Caritas Siem Reap has been involved in community development since 1997. Its projects have included restoration of a four-kilometer road and construction of three schools, two dams and more than 100 wells. The agency arranges animal vaccination and has helped establish 90 orchards, 60 vegetable gardens, 25 duck farms and seven fish farms as well as started 17 credit unions in 10 villages and a handicraft project.
Among planned projects is a supplemental food program for hundreds of school children in four villages to reduce malnutrition among them.
According to Masson, Glisse wanted to work for the poor in a less-developed country since she was a girl. The opportunity came in 1978, when she worked with the International Red Cross as a midwife in Cambodian refugee camps in Thailand.

Battambang apostolic prefecture, based 75 kilometers southwest of Siem Reap in Battambang, Cambodia's second-largest city, has eight priests, one of whom is Cambodian, 20 nuns and 30 lay missioners from various countries. Monsignor Enrique Figaredo, a Spanish Jesuit, is the apostolic prefect. The area covered by the prefecture has about 3 million people, almost all of whom are Buddhists. Catholics number no more than 10,000, according to local Church data. Siem Reap has about 20 ethnic Khmer Catholic families and 15 ethnic Vietnamese Catholic families.