How it started

“There is a family that needs your help”, a fellow church member tells her. “What’s the issue”? Alice Theuri asks. “There are 3 children whose parents have died of HIV and the youngest – barely 2 years is HIV positive. Their grandmother – who is their only caregiver is old and sickly too”. Alice asked to be taken to that home and her compassion took over. She connected with the kids, started feeding the family, clothing them, educating them and counselling them. When the grandmother became too sick, Alice organized on how she would be cleaned, she got her a wheel chair, visited her and prayed with her often, and ensured that she got her monthly shopping on time, including firewood. The youngest child in that family is now a teenager in a secondary school, while the others are all grown up now. The grandmother, though still ailing is cleaner, happier, well taken care off and fed.

Who is Alice Theuri?

Many call her ‘Mum’ others mentor, pastor, social worker, Christian counsellor, a friend depending on how they got connected. She grew up like a normal child, enjoying the life of a village girl in a big family. Until one day at 15 years, her mother lost her life after a short illness. This shook her to the core because being a second born and the oldest daughter, she had to grow up and take on the responsibilities of the family. “I had a very hard time when my mum died because I could get out of school, fetch firewood and water and still take care of the young ones.  My dad at the time was alive and was taking care of our needs. This is when I realized losing a mother in the family is a very difficult struggle,” recalls Theuri. However, this was just the beginning of the long journey of becoming her siblings “mother” when her father passed away. Here she had to step in as the responsible one and did whatever she could to put food on the table and clothing for her siblings. “I am happy and I thank God when I see what has become of my brothers and sisters over the years” she says smiling. Now with her own family, after 37 years of marriage, she has a reason to thank God. 

Fast-forward, Alice Theuri is now a household name in five counties situated in Central Kenya as she spearheads assisting as many children homes as she can. She has become “The voice of the voiceless” and the link between the needy and the well-wishers. According to her, she opted to rather work with children homes in offering them basic needs instead of having her own children’s home. Theuri lives in Nyeri and has been working for the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) since its inception.  She is the Founder of Prophetic Youth Ministries located in Nyeri County. “In 1998 I got very sick and was admitted to Mathari Hospital where I was diagnosed with breast cancer and later on transferred to Kenyatta National Hospital where I received my medication for years…… My healing from cancer was a miracle that has not yet been understood because through all the stages of chemotherapy I never lost my hair at all and was completely healed after the treatment,” explained Alice. These difficult grounds in her life caused her pain and decided that she would instead take a bigger cause after she was given a second chance by the Almighty. In 2004, she decided to start with assisting the less fortunate in the society with the little she had. She used to have fellowships in her house with youths whom she counselled and taught them the word of God. The house fellowship grew in number and pushed her into thinking how to cater for the growing number. In 2007 she registered a youth ministry whose initial mission was counselling, assisting the less fortunate and mentorship. Theuri says they were using money from their own pockets to feed the more than 30 kids they started out with. 

Orphan Reach Network

In the yester years the ministry through her leadership has been able to visit more than 20 children homes in different counties, fed and clothed thousands of children, to the glory of God. A few years ago, they started a school fees paying program for high school students but started out with 15 kids as they continue to source for funds to enrol more of the orphaned children. This way, they do follow ups on the children and go through their schools’ report forms for better monitoring and creating a future strong education base for them. Through this program, many more orphans in children’s homes have completed form four. In addition, Theuri through friends has connected orphans to jobs after completion of secondary school studies. Committed to helping children stay in school, Theuri’s plea to the government is to have a system whereby they take up orphaned children after secondary school education in National Youth Service (NYS) as she cites that most well-wishers only cater for school fees up to secondary education. At the same time, she cites that it takes a very long time for orphaned children who were under their parents’ care to access their unclaimed assets.

“I never chose to be an orphan or a widow” she says sadly. “When my husband passed on in 2016, I experienced the challenges that widows go through; rejection by the community and the in laws, long succession processes while still grieving their late husbands. I felt the push to add widows to be part of the group I fight for”. She started ‘Daughters of hope’ program during Covid-19 and helped 36 widows at Gitathi-ini, then others at Chania. This group has extended to street families that are always calling her or coming to the office, because their families slept hungry and are looking for food. Through this program, she counsels widows and encourages them to positively continue with life despite losing their husbands and assets.

During Covid-19, she also noticed a major problem among the girls in Children’s homes. In the course of their menstrual periods, they reported to use torn pieces of clothes, for lack of sanitary pads and they would skip school on such days. They each had 1 or 2 panties only. Alice therefore started an initiative dubbed, “For Girls, by Girls” whose mandate is to supply sanitary pads and underwear to such girls all over Nyeri County. She plans to extend this initiative to secondary schools as the needy girls there also need it. To date, apart from a few corporates that have joined her generous cause, Theuri’s team largely makes the contribution.

She wants to engage more with influential decision-makers and thought leaders in public policy especially regarding orphans and widows. Alice is open to challenges, conversations, and an exchange of ideas from the top players in the government and in the private sector. Her long-term goal is to become a national-level policy adviser for orphans and widows. She wants to use her untiring commitment and drive to bring more dignity and autonomy to the orphans and widows all over the country. When not rescuing thrown-away kids, or packing ‘unga’ for distribution to widows in the slums or at a timber yard bargaining for firewood for children’s home, or in a 3-hour counselling session in her office, Alice Theuri loves to travel, listen to music and read and teach the word of God.