How toilets can change the world

If you’re at a festival or camping this summer, you might just miss a few creature comforts – including your toilet.
It’s easy to take our smallest room for granted – until we’re caught short or forced to make do with… more modest arrangements. It’s good to remember how blessed we are to have essentials such as clean water on tap and safe toilets.
One in three people in the world still don’t have a safe, clean toilet. Without proper sanitation, families often fall prey to sickness and disease, which means they can’t work or earn or go to school – and so they become trapped in poverty. A child under the age of five dies every two minutes due to dirty water and poor sanitation.
Toilet Twinning offers one practical way to show our gratitude for life’s bare necessities and reach out to people living in poverty overseas. The campaign, which is part of Tearfund, invites you to ‘twin’ your toilet with a latrine overseas for £60 and so help a family abroad have a proper toilet, clean water and hygiene training.

Life for Sita and her family in Ivory Coast has improved dramatically since they built their toilet (Image: Tom Price/Toilet Twinning)
In the remote, rural communities where the toilet-building programmes are taking place, a simple pit latrine can be literally life-changing. In northern Ivory Coast, Sita had been suicidal because her family was so deep in debt. Because they had no toilet, they were constantly sick and needing to buy medicines they couldn’t afford. A basic toilet restored their health – and their hope. Now they can afford to send their children to school and they’re even build a new home.
So next time you spend a penny, take a moment to thank God for your toilet. And consider if you could use our Toilet Twinning-themed session, perhaps around harvest time or World Toilet Day (19 November), to share the wonders of toilets with others.

Visit the Toilet Twinning website
Download the Toilet Twinning Messy Church session