ABSTRACT
Historically, the private givers of foreign Agency for International Development were individuals–those who contributed money and those who volunteered their working lives. Most of them made their contributions through religious institutions, either individual churches or organized missionary societies. In 1951, the Reverend John Peters preached a Sunday morning sermon in St. Luke's Methodist Church in Oklahoma City. As Paul McCleary of Church World Service points out, the World Council of Churches and the Vatican operate networks that have existed for many years and have continued to function through all kinds of turmoil in some very chaotic countries. Church givers and most individual donors tend to channel their gifts through American-based church bodies or interdenominational or independent agencies, and sometimes give directly to an individual church, hospital, or school overseas with which they have had some contact. Thus, if private voluntary organizations have faced considerable apathy as they sought funds from individual contributors, that condition may be replaced by hostility.
