The guide is to ensure that Christian leaders understand WASH issues to help cause attitudinal and behavioural change through the engagement of other Christians.

Mr Dickens Thunde, the Director of the Organisation, who made the call, said, Christians in Africa were not living up to expectation and it was high time they lived their lives holistically by making lives better for the needy.

This was during the opening session of a two-day National Partnership Forum on Transformational Development being held in Accra. It is a collaborative effort with faith-based organisations to help identify the most vulnerable and how to meet their needs.

 Mr Thunde explained that World Vision’s mission was to follow Jesus in working with the poor and oppressed, and to promote human transformation, seek justice and be witnesses to God’s Kingdom, all to put smiles on the faces of children and their families.

Mr Thunde mentioned five new strategies adopted by the group in line with the SDGs to effectively carry out their mandate as; deepening their commitment to the most vulnerable, focus on Ministry for greater results, collaborating and advocating for broader impact, delivering high quality service and living out faith and calling with boldness.

The Sermon guide developed by World Vision was as a result of the fact that Ghana achieved eight percent in sanitation, 15 percent living without toilet facilities, 19 percent defecate openly, about 60 percent share latrines while 58 per cent indiscriminately disposing waste, as released by Water Resource Commission.

Also, more than 3.5 million people have no access to safe water.

He said in term of religion, Christians were the majority with 71.2 percent out of the total population, so the Organisation decided to bring in faith leaders to help engage Christians on the challenges of the menace and for change behaviour.

Its themes were developed by experts, backed by the Scriptures, reviewed by the Ghana Integrated WASH Programme for Technology, among various Christian leaders.The Sermon guide, he revealed included importance of WASH, personal hygiene, hand washing at critical times, food hygiene, water safety at point of use, and child health.

Sanitation; human excreta disposal, care for the environment, sustainability; community ownership and management were the other topics treated in the guide and are all backed with Biblical quotations.The Reverend Godwin Ahlijah, the Executive Director of Meaningful Life International, an NGO, said, the Gospel was holistic, therefore Christians should not only be Heavenly minded, but of “a little earthly use,” thus, the guide should be made to work.

He advised that the Sermon guide would not be theoretically launched but be infused in the course outline of Bible schools, used as Sunday school study material and added to morning devotional manuals.Rev Ahlijah suggested that the book be introduced in the educational curriculum as it would change and save the country.

The media should also promote it by provoking discussions, among other programmes to make the content known to all and sundry, he appealed. Rev Nii Armah Ashitey, the Chairman for the occasion, called on all Christian leaders, to commit to the promotion of WASH ideals.