January 2026 Mission Trip Recap

Looking Back on Our Mission Trip

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Manos Memories

Introduction

The road to 2026 has finally brought us to our destination and on January 7th, we began our Honduran adventure for our 26th year as a ministry. We are excited to share about new initiatives, revitalized efforts, and prospects for the year to come!

 Look back with us on what was an amazing journey full of excitement, wonder, and God’s love as we worked side by side with our Honduran friends yet again!

Education

Our education initiatives continued this year with some new imaginings! 

After arriving safely in Honduras and settling in at our hotel in Danlí, we began our ministry efforts the next day by touching base with our friends in partners in Honduras, interviewing scholarship applicants and beginning work on a new playground at the Iglesia Manos de Dios. Applicants interviewed included Carol (14), Carlos (14), and Hiuber (12).

During one of our evenings, we had an event honoring our top five students in the 2025 academic year. Sandra, Susan, Carol, Andrea, and Valery made up the cohort of students this time around with Andrea being the Valedictorian of her class! Three of them will be starting college this Spring.

As you know, we love supporting our students in all facets of their formation, including fellowship! In order to build bonds of friendship between current students and our graduated professionals and even between them and our missionaries, we put together an event called “Noche de Fortuna”. NDF was a casino themed game night where everyone got together to play, but also had an opportunity to exchange wisdom about college, student-life, and our own lives. Over 30 of our students and professionals were in attendance. This evening was an opportunity to welcome our six recent high school graduates that will be freshman in college starting in January 2026.

We also had our Club Intercambio and Club Aventura events. Thanks to Geoff and a young-adult travel award recipient by the name of Sofia, our Club Intercambio had an incredibly fun 2026 kick-off class full of games and exchange between our Intercambio students and our Manos volunteer participants. For Club Aventura, Patricia led the discussion on a book by the name of “A man called Ove”. This book club has been a great opportunity to foster the love for reading and having insightful discussions.

We love supporting our students and this trip was a love-letter to all of their achievements within and beyond the school! With their holistic development, they’ll be the community leaders of today and tomorrow.

Community Outreach

As the years go on, things change… and so do our ideas! This year we imagined a new way of serving our friends in Honduras. Our vision of “Hondurans helping Hondurans” came about when we decided to take a step back and look at how God can work when we let Hondurans step up and take the lead.

In accordance with this initiative, we partnered with local professionals in order to bring about the vision of Hondurans helping Hondurans, in order to usher in a much more sustainable way of doing things. During our vision clinic event in Danlí, we collaborated with local optometrists and treated 85 patients and commissioned 50 custom pairs of glasses in addition to fitted reading glasses.

Later in the week, we were able to enact the other part of our vision for our “Hondurans helping Hondurans” initiative by taking on a local NGO by the name of Niños de Montaña and connecting them with our community in Santa Maria. They carried out a medical and dental brigade in which we were able to participate in and serve 329 patients from the local and surrounding villages. We had Honduran doctors and dentists leading the brigade assisted by our Manos team and a group of 10 of our Manos scholarship recipients studying medicine, nursing and odontology, which was a great exposure for them.

We also carried out our Manos Fit programming by having our nutrition workshop. We first launched this effort two years ago by working with a local nutritionist who returned this year to teach 25 women in the community how to cook with healthy ingredients and recipes. These skills came in handy for our bake-off a few days later!

Later when we finally had our bake-off with the ladies who were part of the 101 baking healthy workshop. Our 2026 The contestants experimented baking with healthier ingredients that they had never used before such as oat flakes, coconut oil, carrots, bananas etc. The winner of our competition was Our "Reina de la cocina", “Queen of the kitchen” Erika, ¡Felicidades Erika!

What’s a Manos trip without our Copa Manos soccer event! For our friends in Honduras, Fútbol is life! This year, our annual soccer championship match was played on a different field! Thanks to the efforts of our Captains Julio and Dani, we were able to secure a school ground close to the MDD church in order to host our Copa! It was a true community event. Manos de Dios church versus el Buen Pastor church (a community an hour away) was the game and although the Manos team lost 8-0, it was a great time for everyone!

We also had our Mini-Copa for the children at Manos. Thankfully this game was more exciting than the senior game and went into penalties. A truly riveting match that had all the parents and older siblings on the edge of their seats!

A select group of team members also visited the St Mark’s Episcopal (San Marcos, TX) sponsored project at the Ojo de Agua school. St Mark’s has been supporting the Ojo de Agua Pre-school with food security and construction initiatives for the past 20 years. Their visit included a tour of the site as well as checking in on the facilities and staff.

With the help of the Diocese of West Texas World Missions department, we were able to collaborate with our students for a construction & restoration project for the Manos de Dios church’s playground. Tom Porter, Alberto, and several of our students came together to restore and bring back to life a beautiful piece of our parish’s community space.

All of these exciting events help our community come together not just in Honduras but beyond as well. The bonds formed here during these moments carry our friendships beyond all borders. We hope you're excited for our future plans to get our friends involved in community building this summer!

Spiritual Development

Our mission wouldn’t be anything without the blessings of God and we aim to reflect that truth when we gather in the Lord’s name. This trip was full of exciting ministerial moments!

We had a wonderful Sunday service that included a baptism and a VBS session. Bishop Lloyd Allen was celebrating the Eucharist and Baptism at the Manos church. We had the privilege of welcoming our newest Christian... Oliver! Oliver is the son of Cecia and Ruben, alumni of the Manos scholarship program and longtime members of the Manos church. They lovingly chose various members of the team as Godparents. Jessica (on FaceTime), Patricia and Padre David were the padrinos for baby Oliver. In addition, Dani and Mili led VBS with the help of Melanie, Sofia, Caroline, and Anna. Such a blessed day!

We also had an incredible time with the Manos de Dios youth group. Deacon Olga led a conversation about God’s call in our lives with reflections by various members of the Manos team including, Fr. David, Dani, Sofia, and Melanie. Complemented with music by the worship team, this event was one to remember as the conversations were fruitful, the games were stupendous, and the joy was unforgettable.

Closing

After an incredible week of kingdom work, our team set out for Comayagua where we spent one final evening with each other. After an afternoon on the square and a night out on the town, half of the team returned home the next day. For those that stayed, we visited Panacam… a national park full of God’s creation. Leaving Honduras is never easy… but the gifts and experiences we take with us fill us with joy and a desire to share once we’re back home. Thank you for keeping the Manos team in your prayers!