UNITY – Good Samaritans of Unity do not have to travel far to do their international good deeds this coming holiday season.
Francis and Bobi-Jo Leier first became involved with the Shoebox Gifts, a project within Operation Christmas Child organized by Samaritan’s Purse. One of their children was participating in the project through his elementary school.
“We thought it was amazing. We started researching what it was all about and we were hooked,” said Bobbi-Jo.
This will be their eighth year of filling and collecting boxes in the area. Each year, a connection was built with the area co-ordinator in North Battleford. The three of them would talk about OCC and it became apparent that Unity had contributed many shoeboxes over the years.
“She suggested that we think about becoming leaders for an official drop off centre,” Bobbi-Jo says.
The duo started the process this summer, by filling out an application, sharing testimonies, doing phone interviews, working with the parish priest and hours of training. Even with harvest on the go, the training was completed.
A team of volunteers is now being organized and getting ready for National Collection Week.
Those who wish to fill a box can choose between a boy or girl and select which age group they would like to shop for. Shoeboxes can be filled with a variety of items, including pencil crayons, colouring books, dolls, hair brushes, jewelry, hair barrettes, books to read, little toys, water bottles and other items. Items such as food, candy, war-related items, lotions, medications and fragile items are not allowed.
The project was first started in 1993 and has become the world’s largest Christmas project of its kind. More than 209 million shoeboxes have been delivered worldwide to more than 170 countries/territories. OCC would like to collect enough shoeboxes to reach 11 million children.
At the end of the collection week, organizers send all the shoeboxes to the processing centre in Calgary, where each box receives a discipleship book and is inspected by volunteers before being shipped off internationally.
Shoeboxes collected in Canada will be sent to El Salvador, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Senegal, the Gambia, Guinea Bissau, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Ukraine and the Philippines. The collection dates for Unity are Nov. 13 noon to 7 p.m., Nov. 14 and 15 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., Nov. 16 to 18 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Nov. 19 1 to 6 p.m. For any additional information about the project or to get a box, contact Francis or Bobbi-Jo at 306-228-8465 or 306-210-8110.
