This Lent, you can help families grow enough food to eat.
When crops fail, families go hungry because the land they depend on can no longer sustain them.
Too much rain. Too little rain. Nothing can grow.
This Lent, your gift can help communities grow food again — and rebuild their lives with dignity.
By making a monthly gift, you'll be helping even more families grow enough food to eat.
An act of love that helps food grow again
Rejoice with her children
Rejoice is a mother in South Sudan. To protect her children, she was forced to flee conflict twice, losing everything she owned. Just as she began to rebuild her life, disaster struck again.
Severe flooding submerged her farmland. Crops were destroyed. Livestock was lost. Rejoice explains:
“The farmlands were submerged underwater. Everything, including livestock, was completely destroyed.”
Rejoice is a skilled farmer, but when the land disappeared beneath the water, there was nothing she could do. With no food to harvest, she faced the terrifying reality of not being able to feed her children.
But Rejoice didn’t give up. With the support of local experts and donations like yours, she learned a remarkable solution: growing food on top of the water. Floating gardens now rise with the floodwater, allowing crops to grow where fields once lay underwater.
The impact your monthly donation could make
Set-up your monthly gift today and help families like Rejoice, Obayedul, Shorai and Hamunyare’s build a stronger, more resilient future.
£7 a month can help a farmer build and care for their own flood resistant garden for an entire year
£15 a month can fund a pump mechanic to repair and maintain their village’s water pump
£48 a month could help 10 farmers build their own floating garden and maintain them all
FAQs about Lent
Lent is a time of reflection and renewal leading up to the celebration of Easter. It lasts for 40 days from Ash Wednesday to Holy Saturday (not including Sundays).
The practice is based on Jesus’ 40 days in the desert where he fasted, prayed and had to face temptation (Luke 4: 1-13).
Many people think of it as a time to ‘give something up’, but actually it is an opportunity to make important changes in our lives. We can spend the time thinking about how we live, whether we have got our priorities right, saying sorry for the things we have done wrong, and preparing to live in a better way. Then we will be ready for the great celebration of Easter.
During Lent, Christians are asked to pray, to fast and to share what they have with people who are poor (almsgiving). In this way they re-connect with God, with themselves, and with their neighbours.
Easter in 2026 falls on Sunday 05 April. Good Friday is on Friday 3 April.
Easter moves each year because it is always celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon that follows the spring equinox. Jesus’ death and resurrection took place around the Jewish Passover, which is also calculated on the lunar calendar.
This Lent, CAFOD’s Family Fast Day will be on Friday 27 February. The first Family Fast Day was held by a pioneering group of women in 1960. Read more about what the outcome was of that work. We invite you to get involved with our Family Fast Day this year.
You can buy an Easter card and also lots of lovely Easter treats through CAFOD World Gifts. Look out for: Fantastic Fisherfolk. A perfect Easter gift for your loved ones.