Media and specialist spokespeople
Looking for a spokesperson? Contact Paul Donohoe, Head of Media and Communications. Email pdonohoe@christian-aid.org or telephone 01 496 7040 (Dublin office) or +44 777 9624 385
Official Institutions and networks
Christian Aid Ireland receives support from Irish Aid, the official development programme of the Irish government to enable us to deliver our programmes. We also receive support from the European Union.
Christian Aid is a founding member of ACT Alliance, a coalition of 146 churches and faith-based organisations working together in more than 100 countries.
Christian Aid is an active member of 30 networks promoting excellence in the delivery of humanitarian and development programmes, including BOND, Dochas, Sphere, CONCORD, CADA and VOICE.
Christian Aid Ireland is part of several coalitions such as Stop Climate Chaos,Tax Justice Network Ireland and the Irish Consortium on Gender Based Violence to tackle the underlying causes of poverty and challenge the systems that keep people poor.
Sponsoring Churches
We are the official relief, development and advocacy agency of seven Sponsoring Churches in Ireland, and part of the church community worldwide.
British and Irish churches set up Christian Aid so that they, and others, could help refugees in the aftermath of the Second World War and ‘respond to Christ’s command to care for all in need’.
We are accountable and answerable to these churches for all we do. Through regular meetings and ongoing relationships, we work with and through them – locally, regionally and nationally.
The Sponsoring Churches appoint our board members, who are trustees of the vision, values and purpose of Christian Aid – to end poverty and ‘relieve or combat malnutrition, hunger, disease, sickness or distress throughout the world’.
The churches receive our annual reports and accounts, and are responsible for ensuring that our work is reviewed and for raising any issues that might arise.
Working in partnership overseas
In our work overseas, we partner with local, faith-based and secular organisations to carry out our programmes. These organisations are working within their own communities and have a unique insight into the real problems their people are facing, as well as the most effective ways to solve them.
Our partnership model is at the heart of our approach to ending poverty, tackling injustice and building peace. This approach allows us to root our work in the concerns of communities, either by working within communities or linking communities' concerns to national and international processes.
Because we work with local partner organisations, we can work in hard-to-reach places and have the potential to reach the most excluded in any situation, to create social cohesion, strengthen local capacity and support empowerment.
In many places where there is poverty, conflict or violence, our partners have the ability to act as a relationship broker and Christian Aid Ireland supports them to access response mechanisms, donors and advocacy platforms.