Christmas will just be another day

Children and the wonder and joy
of Christmas are linked in most of
our minds and associations. And
also in our experience, since each
one of us was once a child.

If there’s a child in your life who will wake up on Christmas morning with a joyful heart, that child is blessed.

The sadness for us in our work – and we’re sure that you’ll share this sadness – is the number of children who will wake up on Christmas morning with no possibility of joy.

Christmas will be another long, bleak day for the children living on the streets.

For them, Christmas will be just one more day of hurt, hunger, and hopelessness . . .

One is Justin. Abandoned by his mother, and although he lived with his father, extreme poverty forced him to leave school in Grade 9. Things were so bad that he ran away.

Justin sleeps in an open field at the back of a garage. Sandile’s mother died when he was 10, and he was put on a taxi to Johannesburg to live with an aunt. He waited at the station, scared and hungry for three days and nights, but no aunt came.

Befriended by three other children who taught him to beg, Sandile has been homeless for four years.

Nandi is another – homeless and alone. Even though she couldn’t complete her schooling, Nandi nurses a dream of becoming a social worker one day.

Each homeless child has a heartbreaking story behind their situation. But there are also other children, still living with their families but in critical daily need.

We want to make Christmas count for these children too.

Please will you help?

If you’ll click here now to send your special Christmas donation, we’ll do the rest.

Your kindness will ensure that every child who comes to our corps (church) on Christmas day will be assured of a meal – and if enough donations make it possible – the addition of a small gift.

It could be a simple toy, a packet of sweets, an item of clothing or a bar of soap. Each gift will be joyfully and gratefully received.

But most of all, knowing that they are not forgotten at Christmas will be a gift in itself – an expression of love and care springing from your generosity.

On Christmas Day, your gift will find us
preparing tasty and nourishing meals in our
service centres and corps all over the country
to share with our special guests. And we’ll be
thanking you with bowed heads for helping to
‘make Christmas count’ for each child who
benefits from your caring heart.

There was a time when our feeding queues consisted of only adults. But more and more we see children. Children alone, children with a single parent, or children with a grandmother struggling to take care of them.

Whatever amount you’re able to send by clicking here now, your gift will say to a child in need, ‘I care about you on this most joyous celebration of the year.’