To the notes of the song “Whatsoever you do” of the community and of everyone who took part in the project, the inauguration opens on September 14, 2025, for the Toby family’s home – a dream that once seemed distant and impossible comes true. 

The Toby family is made up of a husband and wife, their children, grandchildren, and an adopted son. Together, they prepare to enter into a new chapter: having a place to call home. 

For fourteen years, Liberia’s civil wars left deep scars across society: displacing thousands, tearing apart infrastructure, collapsing livelihood systems. The postwar period has been marked by a slow, difficult journey of reconstruction and reconciliation.  

In the midst of this, Liberia’s cities (especially Monrovia) have borne the pressure of rapid urban growth and pervasive poverty. An estimated 70 percent of Monrovia’s urban population now lives in slum settlements surrounding the capital (icscentre.org). 

UN-Habitat data indicate that a large share of Liberia’s urban dwellers live in inadequate housing conditions with insecure tenure (UN-Habitat). 

In Monrovia, slum areas such as West Point, Clara Town and Logan Town, characterize a reality of overcrowding, lack of basic services and vulnerability to flooding, diseases, and eviction. (Cities Alliance). 

These conditions are not just “poverty” in the abstract, they are violations of human dignity and rights. To live without stable shelter, flooded in rain, exposed to disease, and vulnerable to eviction is a hardship deeply felt –  especially by the poorest and most marginalized. 

In this challenging context, the Society of St. Vincent de Paul (SSVP) Liberia, in collaboration with its partners, has initiated a project of restoration and hope. The first house was built in Whenzon Bernard Farm Community, in Paynesville, Montserrado County. 

Beneficiaries were chosen on the basis of urgent humanitarian need. After repeated visits to urban poor settlements in Monrovia, SSVP’s special project team established a locally grounded, non-discriminatory approach to selection. 

Toby’s family was chosen, having endured extremely harsh conditions in a small zinc shack.

Mr. Toby, although unemployed, holds a degree in Criminal Justice and has a deep passion for learning. Despite severe constraints and poverty, with the occasional help of relatives and friends, he managed to send his children to school and provide some modest shelter for his family. However, their living situation remained precarious: a shack often subject to flooding, lacking security and physical safety.

The project did not have an easy path. It began in 2023 but was delayed because of fundraising challenges and only picked up again in November 2024. Thanks to the combined efforts of the local community, the Antonius Conference in South Tyrol, Italy, SSVP Liberia, and the FHA Solidarity Fund the dream finally came back to life. 

In Liberia, homelessness is not merely a social issue: it is a human rights crisis. Mr. and Mrs. Toby’s hardship was not by choice, but the result of deeper systemic failures. 

Mr. and Mrs. Toby each expressed profound gratitude to SSVP, FHA, and all donors and volunteers who made this possible. 

The new house was blessed by Fr. Dennis Nimene, from the Catholic Bishop Conference (CABICOL) who represented the archbishop of Monrovia with the support of the SSVP spiritual advisor Fr. Martin Dunhamn. 

During the blessing Father Dennis said:

“Mr. Toby and your family, we want to give you the keys of this house, from the Catholic Church, through the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul, and all donors that contributed. This is for you and your family to have a place to call home.” 

This first home is more than a building, it is a sign that the dignity of the poorest matters. It is a sign that solidarity can make the impossible possible, and that housing is not charity but justice. In the heart of Liberia’s slums, where so many live without services or security, it stands as a seed of hope – one that can grow, multiply, and inspire lives transformed and dignity restored.

* SVP Liberia, Africa 1, Zone 1,  Coordinator Bro. Victor Eze; Gabriel Antwi, Conference President of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Chaplaincy, SSVP CIAD representative, University of Ghana; two SSVP delegates from Sierra Leone — the National Training Officer, Bro. Patrick Massaquoi, and the National Youth Coordinator, Bro. Gabriel Tengbe; the Spiritual Advisor of SSVP Liberia, Fr. Martin Durham; the General Secretary of the Catholic Bishops’