A Challenge to Give

Nov

posted by Brandi on November 29, 2010

With the holiday season in full force, I want to offer a challenge. And this challenge isn’t just for you – I’ll be participating and offering this up to my family, too.

If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you know that these boys have stolen my heart.

But Jose and Norman are just two boys out of 60 at Jovenes.

Just 2 kids out of hundreds in a country that gives them the message that children are a nuisance and worthless. That they are easy to get rid of and better off dead.

Two kids that, without Jovenes, would have been left on the street, pick pocketing to survive, and addicted to drugs to deal with the pain and despair of everyday life.

Every year, my family and I travel to Honduras (paying our own way) to volunteer at an orphanage for homeless, abused and abandoned children called Jovenes en Camino, located about 25 miles south of the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa.

This amazing program (run completely from donations) houses more than 60 children and with very limited resources and educates, houses, feeds and gives them the tools so they can start to change the society and culture in the country.

Honduras is in great need of responsible male role models, ones who want to be good fathers and caretakers and contributing members of society. In a country that is still ravaged by poverty, natural disasters and rampant crime, this program is truly needed.

If you would like to read more about our travels in Honduras, check out some of the blog posts here.

In conjunction with Holly and Jovenes, I am hoping to help raise $1000 by Christmas to donate to Jovenes en Camino.

If you can, we would be honored if you all would help out.

It takes $28,000 per MONTH to keep Jovenes running, and while I know money is tight for all of us, every little bit we can raise is going to help them cover their costs.

Just to show you what your contribution can do:

$25 = support of children at Jovenes
$50 = purchase backpacks & school supplies
$75 = funds skills training program
$100 = purchase school shoes & uniforms

The minimum donation is whatever you want it to be. Maybe you can go without a new jar of almond butter or coconut milk ice cream and donate that $5-10 here instead. Or maybe you can give more and sacrifice your holiday lattes for the month of December. In the grand scheme of things, it might not be much of a sacrifice for YOU, but it can make a huge difference to them.

I can vouch for this orphanage, for this program, for these boys: anything, everything you can give, is used to keep the orphanage running, to keep the boys healthy and educated and to help give them a life that they wouldn’t have otherwise.

Please consider giving this season.

Share the blessings you’ve received with someone less fortunate.

If you are feeling merry this holiday season,
please click here to donate to Jovenes!

Or here.

And perhaps here.

You can click here too.

Donations are completely secure and private.

We would appreciate any linkbacks you can give to this on your blog, e-mails you can send to family + friends as well as any other ways you can think to encourage others to donate (Tweet! Facebook! Call!).

Again, we are hoping for $1000 by Christmas so we can provide Jovenes with the much-needed funds to help them continue doing their selfless, amazing work.

Thank you all for everything you do – I know how amazing this community is and the power that comes when people truly get behind something they believe in.

Love and good wishes,

Holly + me

posted under Recipe