| Nguyen Thi Thanh Binh was a teenager when she fled with her parents during the fall of Saigon. In rural Loveland, Colorado, she made a new life and found happiness in her marriage to American Jack Rybacki, motherhood and her Christian faith. When the unthinkable happened, and her infant son, Garrett, died of a sudden illness, she challenged God to give meaning to her despair. A Necessary Journey tells Binh’s inspiring story as a mother’s suffering is transformed into newfound purpose and a medical mission that now brings hope and healing to thousands of Vietnamese children.
In 1993, Binh first returned to Vietnam to face the ghosts of her past. She found a country vastly changed, where 80% live below poverty level and countless children are abandoned to the streets, begging, peddling, and sold into sexual slavery. When she discovered 27 orphans hiding together for safety, she wired Jack for $2,000 to open her first orphanage. That was the beginning of Children of Peace International (COPI). Today COPI cares for more than 6,000 Vietnamese children with schools, orphanages, hospital support and Hanoi’s first pediatric HIV clinic. A Necessary Journey follows the fearless, irreverent Binh and the Children of Peace team on a 17-day medical mission through Vietnam. Binh’s story unfolds as we meet many of the 42 dedicated volunteers on a journey that takes them from remote mountain villages to Hue, the Imperial City flattened by the 1968 Tet Offensive, Hanoi, and cosmopolitan Saigon. Together they deliver urgently needed medical care to children and families whose lives have been forever changed by the violent aftermath of war. A Necessary Journey powerfully reminds us of how one person can make a difference. Binh’s journey is also our journey, as we witness a God who often heals us in our broken places through serving others. FILM FESTIVAL AWARDS – 2009
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