Our History

Eunice Rufunda, a licensed Clinical Therapist, received a bachelors degree in Economics from California State University, Northridge.  She also received a Masters degree in Counseling Psychology from National University, San Diego. For the last 16 years, she has worked in Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health contracted agencies in various program settings, including traditional clinics and field based outpatient, Wraparound services, and Multidisciplinary Assessment Team (MAT). In the last 9 years, Eunice has worked extensively with programs servicing the Birth to Five population, low-income, and high-risk families by providing early interventional services to young children and their families.  This intervention is to prevent and address intergenerational trauma, as well as mental health issues related to trauma exposure. She opened her private practice in 2010.

Eunice has served as a volunteer on several mission teams nationally and abroad. In 2013, she was invited to join a medical/missions team from her church (The Church On The Way, The First Foursquare Church of Van Nuys, CA), to the country of her birth, Uganda. It was during this trip, that the vision of starting Bridges of Comfort International was born.

Uganda has been named amongst the 20 most beautiful countries in the world. It’s beauty is manifested in the natural sceneries and the warmth and hospitality of its people. Early explorers, including Henry Morton Stanley called Uganda, “The Pearl of Africa.”  However, the name was made popular by Winston Churchill, in his 1908 book entitled “My African Journey.”  In his book, Winston Churchill described his trip to Uganda in 1907.

“The kingdom of Uganda Is like a fairy-tale. You climb up …and at the end there is a wonderful new world. The scenery is different, the vegetation is different, the climate is different, and most of all, the people are different from anything elsewhere to be seen in the whole range of Africa…. I say ‘Concentrate on Uganda.’  For magnificence, for variety, of form and color. For profusion of brilliant life, bird, insect, reptile, beast-for vast scale, Uganda is truly The Pearl Of Africa.

Uganda is from end to end a ‘beautiful garden’ where ‘staple food’ of the people grows almost without labour of the people. Does it not sound like a paradise on earth? It is the Pearl of Africa.”

The name in and of itself appears to have been prophetic. The process of making a pearl results from the secretion of ‘nacre’ by an oyster to protect itself from ‘irritants’ such as parasites. Uganda has had its share of ‘irritants,’ such as wars, poverty, sickness and disease including the AIDS/HIV epidemic, hence the need for people like you and I to be the Bridges of Comfort, by being God’s hands extended to rebuild lives, renew hope, and ignite passion in the lives of the next generation, so Uganda can truly fulfill its prophetic name, “The Pearl Of Africa.”