When our kids were 12 and 13, maybe younger, an opportunity for our family to share with others showed itself.  I had found out about a project that a couple from our church had been involved in.  They were connected with a particular, very poor orphanage near Tijuana.  They visited monthly, with donated items of necessity for the children.

I was a sponsor for a young woman in a Confirmation class that they were leading.  Included in the sacramental preparation was service to others, which could take many forms.  One of the things that the kids could choose, was to buy Christmas gifts for the children who lived at the orphanage.  There was a list, which consisted of things like toothbrushes, socks, combs and hairbrushes, all of them things we take for granted.  I thought to myself, “How terrible. Those things are bare necessities.  That’s not much of a Christmas.”

After our meeting, I went up and asked how many kids lived there and could I have a list of names and ages.  She said she would get it to me. I had no idea what I was going to do, but I wanted to do something.  I went home to talk to the family about it.

When I told them about the kids and this list of “gifts” for them, they all felt the same as me.  But, what were we going to do?  When I received the list, we brainstormed. There were almost 90 kids on the list and their ages ranged from 2 to 19 years old.  We had something like 60 to 75 dollars that we could out of our budget, to spend.  What in the world could we buy, so that each of them would get something?

We decided to go to Price Club, a membership store that had bargains for things that you buy in bulk.  We walked down the aisles and searched for ideas.  Even without the age spread, we had a problem with having less than a dollar for each present.

We were just strolling along, and then we saw notebooks of paper.  Yeah, everyone could use paper! And what about a pencil and pen to go with them?  After adding up the cost of these, by buying them in bulk, we found that we still had some money left.  The kids found the final addition,one package of gum each. I know it doesn’t sound like much, but these kids didn’t have much.  My friend had told me about how they were just so grateful for every little thing they were given.  And she spoke of how they shared everything and got along so well.

We went home and began the process of unwrapping the packaging, separating the items, and putting them into piles, ready to be wrapped in Christmas paper.  The kids wrapped all of the gifts while I worked on the name tags.  I typed out each one, so they would be easily read. It took quite a long time to wrap all of the presents.  I think that it was a couple of afternoons, after school.  Then we put on the name tags, and put in a few extra gifts, without the tags, in case they would get anyone new at the orphanage.  We put them in boxes, ready to be picked up.

We enjoyed the experience so much, but were unprepared for the lessons we learned.  The kids there were happy, and they didn’t have the things we take for granted.  We found out what you can do with a little money and thought, and a lot of caring.  But the most important lesson came much later.  We received a call from the couple, thanking us for the gifts.  The kids had all been so excited about these meager (to us) gifts we had given them.  Do you know why?  They were so happy because we had put their name on their present. These kids had never gotten a gift before, with their name on it.  The gifts had always just been given to whoever was next in line.

Can you imagine what that must have been like?  But then again, they had been happy with a toothbrush.  Happiness had nothing to do with the things they got.  It had to do with human respect, sharing and caring and being called by name.