Survive-MIVA is a UK-based Catholic Lay Association and a registered charity (no. 268745). Founded in Liverpool in 1974, we make grants to fund essential transport for the Church’s vital health outreach work and pastoral ministry in the Global South.
As an association, our members are our staff, our trustees, and our team of volunteer speakers, who make short lectern appeals to fundraise in Catholic parishes across England, Scotland and Wales. Our main sources of income are voluntary giving in response to these appeals, and donations from readers of our twice-yearly magazine, ‘Awareness’.
We fund bicycles for parish catechists, motorbikes for parish priests to visit isolated rural communities to say Mass and celebrate the Sacraments, four-wheel vehicles for trained personnel (usually Sisters from indigenous religious orders) to make rough-terrain journeys taking vital mobile healthcare, child vaccinations, and pre- and post- natal care to those off the beaten track. Priority is given to indigenous communities.
The generosity of our supporters means that equipment can be transported, and makeshift clinics for preventable diseases can be programmed, to have the greatest impact on those whose needs would otherwise go unattended.
All the money we raise is pooled into a central fund which is distributed by the Allocations Committee. They are volunteers who have financial administration and accountancy expertise, and/or experience of missionary projects overseas and the challenges this brings, as they themselves have faced them – in some cases for many years.
They meet twice or three times a year according to resources available. At least two Trustees then approve the payment of grants via international bank transfer to institutional (not individual) accounts overseas for the in-country purchase of the mode of transport.
Each year, we receive around 800 requests, although we are by no means able to meet all these diverse needs – not even those which stem from Catholic sources, which we prioritise – and we make on average 35 to 40 grants annually. We do what we can, when and where we can, and have always said that we are nothing if not realistic.
We are still based in Liverpool, and have three employees, who manage fundraising at home and prepare for the allocation of grants overseas. They report to the Trustees, who meet quarterly; and there is an Annual General Meeting to which all staff and members are invited.
