Being a time for giving, and in the true spirit of Christmas, Delapre Lodge No.1911 recently contributed fourteen boxes to Operation Christmas Child, a charitable project run by Samaritan's Purse, a Christian charity.
Since 1990, more than 124-million boys and girls from over 150 countries have benefited from a shoebox of Christmas gifts donated through this project. Churches of several denominations and many schools have been involved from across the world.
Many of the recipients are children experiencing poverty and deprivation, either because they’re refugees, or because they’re living in war-zones, famine hotspots or other areas of need.
Taking this into account, it’s not surprising that Operation Christmas Child recommends that gift-boxes contain school supplies and basic toiletries in addition to toys. There are no strings attached to the gifts and, quite appropriately for Freemasons, the inclusion of anything of a religious or political nature is explicitly banned.
Delapre Lodge's initial contribution of £230 was proposed by WBro Mike Walsh and funded ten gift-boxes. He and Bro Lukasz Kusiak, also of Delapre Lodge, bought the gift-items, decorated the boxes and packed them.
A combination of canny buying together with further generosity by Delapre Lodge members/visitors took the final tally of boxes to fourteen.
Northampton as a whole contributes about two-thousand boxes to Operation Christmas Child - the above picture shows some of those boxes at the collection point in Brixworth