|PIC1|The Bible Society in the UK is helping to fund the distribution of Bibles to children in Ghana.

The Bible Society of Ghana aims to give a million Bibles to children across the country by 2011.

The effort has received the backing of Ghana’s First Lady, Ernestina Naadu Mills, a long time supporter of Bible Society.

The Bible Society of Ghana has already passed the halfway mark, with the 500,000th Bible handed out by Mrs Mills during a recent church visit.

Brian Dacre, Head of Supporter Relations at Bible Society in Swindon, said: “Funding this project has been made possible thanks to the amazing generosity of our supporters.

“Some 500,000 Bibles have now been given to schoolchildren who otherwise had no chance of getting one.”

Schoolboy Kelvin, whose surname has been withheld, is one of the children to have received a Bible. He struggled at school in Ghana’s capital Accra until he started reading his own copy of the Bible and was able to discover God who was always there to help him.

Mr Dacre said: “After reading his copy Kelvin began asking for God’s help every day and found that school was easier. It’s an amazing story of how interaction with God, through the Bible, impacted on one child’s life.”