Mathare Community Outreach Project is a grassroots, non-sectarian inter-denominational Christian human development program. Our mission is to improve the quality of life of the disadvantaged children and their families living in the Mathare Valley slum in Nairobi Kenya.

Currently, there are over 1,200 children in the program from over 600 families. Most of these children only have one parent living at home, and many are AIDS orphans.

About Mathare Valley

Mathare Valley in Nairobi, Kenya, is referred to as the oldest and the worst slum in Africa. The area is very densely populated with almost 500,000 people living in a very small area of 2 kilometers by 300 meters (1.2 miles by .2 miles). Attempts by Christian churches to penetrate Mathare with the Gospel have often been met with stern resistance and hostility from the brewers and drug dealers.

The Mathare Community Outreach Church has therefore adopted a home based church concept, to ensure that the members of the community take full responsibility for their neighbors' spiritual lives. It has established the New Life Celebration Center as the weekly meeting point for the celebration of what Christ can do.

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Project Background

The project was founded by Pastor Daniel Ogutu in 1994 in response to the needs of the children who were part of his ministry as resident Pastor of the African Inland Church in Mathare. Later, Mrs. Magdeline Ogutu, wife of Pastor Ogutu, resigned from her job as an Accountant in order to respond full time to the spiritual and physical needs of the poor mothers and children served by the Church.

The Project's vision expanded when Magdeline moved inside Mathare Valley 4-B and discovered that the children were in greater need. They were hungry, malnourished, and some were dying. The Church rented a small room about 8X6 feet, where she provided uji (porridge) which was their only meal at the time. She also taught the children songs, Bible memory verses, reading, writing, and arithmetic. In the afternoon, she would go with the children to visit their homes and witness to their parents.

The project started with 15 children. After two weeks they were reaching 40 children, and after one month there were 150 children being helped. Other volunteers from the Church joined her, and the program continued to expand.

Our Mission

1. To improve the quality of life of the needy children and their families in the Mathare Valley slum in Nairobi, Kenya.
2. To develop the capacity of the children and their families to become fully responsible for their own lives, and to be able to contribute to their families' development.
3. To stimulate and strengthen Mathare residents' participation in their own family development initiatives, in order to achieve sustainable development.
4. To network with other organizations which contribute to the care, development and education of children in Mathare.
5. To strengthen emotional bonding of child/sponsor relationship- both locally and internationally.
6. To provide spiritual nourishment to the area's residents through preaching the saving power of Jesus Christ.

How a seven-year-old boy changed the life of thousands

Somewhere between 1910 and 1915 an American missionary ventured into the region of Kisumu Kenya near Lake Victoria to share the gospel of Christ with the Luo tribe. Among many others, a young boy was taken by the gospel story and was led to Christ and discipled by that missionary. That seven-year-old was Pastor Daniel's father. His father later pastored his small village church and raised a large family of devoted Christian brothers and sisters. One of his sons was Daniel Ogutu. After a successful career as an engineer, Daniel could no longer deny the calling that God had for him, and he and his wife gave up all that he had in 1994 to care for the abandoned in Mathare. Thousands of children and their parents have heard the gospel message through the work that God has done using Pastor Daniel.