operation christmas child

[themumfairy]

I'm doing operation christmas child this year to show ds 1 and 2 the true meaning of Xmas. What sort of things do you all put in? Ideally for their own ages 6 and 8. Also any other charitable Xmas ideas welcome. I'll be 8/9 months pregnant in December so might not be able to get around much but want to show them that it's not all about presents as some are less fortunate

My 9 year old enjoys (not sure that's the right word) adding extra items to the Food Bank trolley at the supermarket as well as buying food for their school harvest assembly collection in aid of local homeless people.

loads of shoe boxes being sent all over in my area, from loads of different orgs.

we do a varierty. its a lovely thing to do. just remember send appropriate for where you are sending too, ie gloves to africa?

expat My quotation was taken directly from the UK site. It clearly states its connection with Samaritan's Purse, has a Christian Ethos statement, a statement of faith and that is in addition to the quotation above which is taken from the section 'What We Do'. I can understand you having a problem with aspects of this but claiming the charity is trying to hide the evangelistic aspect of its work is lunacy.

In addition, expat, it is not necessary to check the parent organisation's website at all. Have you actually looked at the Operation Christmas Child website? You seem determined to find subterfuge where none exists.

As for school's failing to give all the information, that is entirely a matter for the individual parent and the school. Provided that Operation Christmas Child states its Christian ethos on its promotional literature (and it certainly does), I see nothing inherently manipulative with a smaller 'how to' leaflet that is designed to be easily read and for a specific purpose.

How are parents expected to realise they should be checking the parent organisation's website? Well, they don't have to as I've pointed out. Also, we live in a country that many still see as predominantly Christian. Charitable organisations with a Christian ethos have been working with schools for decades, if not centuries. If this is a problem for many parents, it is again something to take up with the school.

Forgot to say - I'm interested that you see any kind of advertising or promotional work as a 'lure'. Do you see sinister overtones in all faith-based children's work, or is it just when 'poor people' who apparently cannot make a decision are involved?

The 'true meaning of Xmas' is surely the supposed both of the Jewish messiah?

birth

There is a big difference between a charity having a Christian ethos, which many charities do (e.g. Christian Aid, Trussell Trust) and they are motivated by that to help people in practical ways, and being primarily an evangelical organisation which uses the provision of aid or gifts as a way to carry out missionary work.

I would have no issues at all with a school supporting a Christian Aid campaign, as they do not combine evangelism with doing good work. I donate to my local food bank, which is run by the Trussell Trust, because they genuinely distribute their food parcels without trying to use that as an evangelical opportunity.

expat I would disagree with the view that a charity cannot be sincere about a humanitarian cause if it also chooses to share a religious message. Given how many great humanitarians have been people of faith, it makes very little sense. However I can appreciate that if you don't share the personal faith of a charity with an evangelistic arm, you're unlikely to support it. That is completely your choice. The part I take exception to is the assumption that such a charity performs humanitarian works solely as a vehicle for a message. For this charity, the 'end' to which their efforts are directed is simply showing love; both the gift and the sharing of faith are attempts to do that. The suggestion that the charity does not care about the people they are helping, and pretends to do so in order to win them over to the cause, is pitifully paranoid.

stoppingbywoods I have read all your posts, and all those of exexpat, and it seems pretty clear to me that you really are not reading, or not understanding, or wilfully misrepresenting, what she is saying.

Many of us have a problem with gifts being used to carry out evangelical missionary work in other countries. Labelling it 'love' is rather avoiding the detail of the cultural and religious colonialism involved.

On the other hand, many of us are donating to food banks in the UK run by Christian churches with outreach - but who don't make the gift of food conditional on participation in Christian performance.

I don't see any blurred lines.

stoppingbywoods - I have to agree with LineyReborn about your misreading of my posts. Where have I said anything about insincerity, not caring, pretending to care or anything along those lines?

All I have pointed out is that the primary focus of the Operation Christmas Child scheme is evangelism.

I have no doubt that the people who are distributing the boxes and running the discipleship courses sincerely believe that finding Jesus is the best thing that could ever happen to anyone, and that by converting children away from Islam/Buddhism/Hinduism/other forms of christianity, they are saving them from Satan's grasp.

However, that is not exactly a universally held belief, and I do not think that is the kind of cause that British schools should be encouraging children to donate gifts to promote (and I do not think many of them would support it if they realised that was what was going on).

I would also take issue with your use of the term 'humanitarian' to describe OCC. Distributing gifts and running bible classes are not humanitarian activity, they are missionary work.

Humanitarian aid is about providing safety for people fleeing wars or natural disasters, or improving the lives of people living in poverty by giving them access to food, clean water, better housing, medical care, education etc. There are thousands of genuinely humanitarian charities out there doing precisely those things. Some of them have a Christian ethos, some do not, but the primary focus of their activities is providing the aid that people need, not converting them to a different religion.

For example, nowhere in Christian Aid's statement of values does it mention promoting Christianity - it is all about alleviating poverty. Cafod is similar. Samaritan's Purse, on the other hand, says it aims to "to earn the right to share the love of Jesus Christ through acts of kindness to people in need" - in other words, it believes that helping people gives them the right to evangelise to them.

I think many Christians would not find that acceptable, and Samaritan's Purse has come under frequent criticism for evangelising to people it is supposed to be helping, ]]www.nytimes.com/2001/03/05/world/us-aids-conversion-minded-quake-relief-in-el-salvador.html for example after the earthquake in El Salvador]] (they did similar things in Haiti after the earthquake there).

Sorry, final link fail: El Salvador

In case anyone is wondering why I keep getting involved in the same arguments about Operation Christmas Child/Samaritan's Purse year after year - I have to admit that I am getting rather bored with it.

I would probably have given up engaging with it by now - my children's schools don't take part in OCC, there is nothing personal for me in it - were it not for the attempt last year by Samaritan's Purse to silence criticism on Mumsnet by threatening to sue individual posters.

Some people were so scared they deregistered, and many people are now too worried to post anything critical on threads about Operation Christmas Child.

I was not personally threatened with legal action by Samaritan's Purse, despite being one of the most frequent posters on the threads in question, probably because I always back up my criticism with reference to their own materials or other published sources.

And so I now feel almost obliged to keep on posting the same information and countering the same arguments, just because no one else (or fewer people) are willing to do so. Apologies to anyone else who is getting bored of it, but I am going to keep on posting .

Thank you exexpat.

Liney: I'm at a loss to know how you can accuse me of wilfully misinterpreting what I'm saying when you clearly have not read my posts. Operation Christmas Child does not give conditionally. No child has to do or accept anything in order to have a present. It is a myth (propounded here) that they do.

I have already said several times that I can understand people choosing not to support a charity with an evangelistic message. As far as I'm concerned, that's fine! So there is no need to reiterate why this choice would be made. I get it. Whether or not Christians have a positive message to share with the world is a whole other issue that we would clearly never agree on. Also fine.

However, as I've said, I'm not fine with:

• People of a different/no faith assuming that Christians only give as a means to an end, not because they see the giving as something of inherent value.
• False claims being made that Operation Christmas Child hides its evangelistic agenda (this is made completely clear on the website, as is the link with Samaritan's Purse).
• Samaritan's Purse being blamed for failure on the school's part to make parents aware of the religious ethos for all voluntary efforts of the school.

For one thing, you have described the Christmas box as a 'lure' rather than a gift, expat. A 'lure' is purely a means to an end, and the end is entrapment. Hardly language that would be used if you thought Samaritan's Purse gives a monkeys about giving a child a gift :)

More indication that you haven't looked at the Samaritan's Purse website, expat. Thirty seconds looking for humanitarian (rather than evangelistic work) brings up at least ten clean water projects like this and many others besides, including a 'Safer Slums' project:

^Through our water, sanitation and hygiene programmes, we are identifying the places where clean water is desperately needed and where we could work alongside local partners – both churches and charities – who share our passion.

Since that time, we have been able to provide hundreds of thousands of people with access to clean water and sanitation across Ethiopia, Liberia, Mozambique, Niger, Swaziland, Kenya and Uganda. Another million people have been given access to clean water and sanitation through other Samaritan’s Purse projects managed and run through our Canadian, USA and Australian offices.^

I'm well aware of how 'humanitarian' is defined BTW but many thanks for the patronising tone. I'm also aware of the difference in Christian aid organisations that do not include an evangelistic message (and have studied the differences at graduate level).

evangelising to people it is supposed to be helping

They are helping on a humanitarian level in addition to sharing their religious message. You are in no position to decide what missionaries (or aid workers, for that matter) can and cannot do, provided that they are not causing harm.

On the subject of people being sued by Samaritan's Purse, I for one am quite pleased that a charity cares enough about its purpose and message to take action against some of the fictitious claims that are made about it on mumsnet each year.

'Operation Christmas Child hides its links to Samaritan's Purse' - not even remotely.

'Operation Christmas Child only gives gifts to Christian children' - not even remotely.

'Operation Christmas Child pretends it's a non-religious, non- evangelical organisation' - not even remotely, though a school might not bother to go into it but a different matter.

'Samaritan's Purse is evil because it shares a Christian message' - it's called freedom of speech.

'Samaritan's Purse does no humanitarian work' - completely inaccurate and misleading.

Well, this has been....boring. I think I've heard all the overwrought mumsnet anti-Christian arguments against Samaritan's Purse for one year. Hopefully others reading the thread will be better placed to make their own minds up on a more balanced presentation of the facts than would otherwise be here.

Oh, forgot one of the biggest slanderous claims:

'Operation Christmas Child' makes gift giving conditional upon Sunday school attendance.' Not even remotely.

I said the term 'humanitarian' should not be applied to Operation Christmas Child, not to all of Samaritan's Purse's work. They do carry out some humanitarian aid work, but OCC is not it.

They sometimes invite children to come to Sunday school but that is after they've received their gift and there is no obligation to return. Whatever else that might be, it is not making the shoebox conditional on attending Sunday school.

(I have spent far too much time on the Samaritan's Purse website, as it happens, as well as reading media coverage of it and its leader).

I have never used the word conditional, and in fact expressly said above that it was not conditional. Just that children were hyped up and strongly encouraged to sign up for the discipleship course after being given their boxes.