Project Harambee - All together for Africa is an initiative celebrating the canonization of Josemaría Escrivá ( www.josemariaescriva.info ), founder of Opus Dei, and is funded by donations from participants at the canonization ceremonies and from many others.

Harambee promotes educational programmes in Africa and about Africa – developmental projects on the sub-Saharan region and awareness-building activities elsewhere designed to encourage a positive outlook on African culture. In Kiswahili, Harambee means “all for one”. It is the cry of fishermen as they drag their nets ashore. This same word resounds when collective efforts are made for the common good, such as helping a family in need, or building a new school or church.

Everyone does what they can, whether through their own personal efforts, donations in cash or kind, “all for one” – each and every one gives and, in turn, receives. Harambee collaborates with the Istituto per la Cooperazoine Universitaria ( ICU ), in Rome, Italy which operates in the educational field in Africa.

A society reflecting the love of the heart of Christ

“A man or a society that does not react to suffering and injustice and makes no effort to alleviate them is still distant from the love of Christ's heart. While Christians enjoy the fullest freedom in finding and applying various solutions to these problems, they should be united in having one and the same desire to serve mankind. Otherwise their Christianity will not be the word and life of Jesus; it will be a fraud, a deception of God and man” (Christ is passing by, 167).

Putting the new commandment of love into practice

“It is easy to understand the impatience, anxiety and uneasiness of people whose naturally Christian soul (Cf. Tertullian, Apologeticus, 17 —PL 1,375—) stimulates them to fight the personal and social injustice which the human heart can create. So many centuries of men living side by side and still so much hate, so much destruction, so much fanaticism stored up in eyes that do not want to see and in hearts that do not want to love! “The good things of the earth, monopolized by a handful of people; the culture of the world, confined to cliques. And, on the outside, hunger for bread and education. Human lives — holy, because they come from God — treated as mere things, as statistics. I understand and share this impatience. It stirs me to look at Christ, who is continually inviting us to put his new commandment of love into practice” (Christ is passing by, 111).

One race, one language, one color
 
“Our Lord has come to bring peace, good news and life to all men. Not only to the rich, nor only to the poor. Not only to the wise nor only to the simple. To everyone, to the brothers, for brothers we are, children of the same Father, God. So there is only one race, the race of the children of God. There is only one colour, the colour of the children of God. And there is only one language, the language which speaks to the heart and to the mind, without the noise of words, making us know God and love one another” (Christ is passing by, 106).

Our life is one of service

“That is what our entire life is, my daughters and sons —a service with exclusively spiritual aims, because Opus Dei is not, and will never be —nor could it be—a tool for temporal ends. But at the same time, it is also a service to mankind, because all you are doing is trying in an upright way to achieve Christian perfection, acting most freely and responsibly in all the areas of the civil life. It is a self-sacrificing service that is not degrading, but uplifting; it expands the heart (making it more Roman, in the most noble meaning of the word) and leads one to pursue the honour and the good of people of every nation — to try to see that every day there are fewer people who are poor and uneducated, fewer souls without faith, without hope; fewer wars, less uncertainty, and more charity and peace” (Opus Dei in the Church, p. 107).

Wherever there is poverty, sadness and pain

Opus Dei must be present “wherever there is poverty, wherever there is unemployment, wherever there is sadness, wherever there is pain, so that the pain is borne with cheerfulness, so that the poverty disappears, so that the unemployment is overcome – because we form people in a way that helps them hold jobs – so that Christ is put in the life of each person – to the extent he wants, because we are friends of freedom.” (In A glance toward the future from the heart of of Vallecas, Madrid, 1998, p. 135. Words from October 1, 1967.)

Fighting against injustice, hunger and ignorance

— “And how can we fight effectively,” inquired someone from the back of the audience hall, “against hunger, injustice, ignorance?” — “My son, we go after it, with a force that is holy, supernatural. We try to bring about a world with less poverty, less ignorance, more justice. I will tell you that the first means is prayer, self-sacrifice, which you can do in your work, doing it well. And then, treating all with affection, with a friendship that is loyal, honorable, humane and supernatural. Little by little things will improve – without violence, for violence brings nothing more than disorder and horrors worse than those one sought to avoid.” (In A glance toward the future from the heart of Vallecas, Madrid, 1998, p. 138. Words from October 1, 1967)