This past Advent St Aidan’s and St Thomas the Apostle joined together to provide special Christmas gift bags to the women in the city of Ottawa emergency shelter at the Dempsey Community Centre on Russell Road. These women are being accommodated in the gymnasium as there isn’t room at the other emergency shelters in Ottawa.
The idea of the gift bags started when I, as a member of the board of Cornerstone Housing for Women and a parishioner of St Aidan’s, became aware that Cornerstone would be providing gift bags to all of its residents and suggested that St Aidan’s could do the same for the 60 women that would be at Dempsey, which is less than half a kilometer from the church. The Rev. Rosemary Parker and Debbie Trickey, a warden at St Aidan’s, fully supported the idea. To make sure we were able to have a gift bag for each woman, St Aidan’s asked St Thomas if they would like to help. They were more than happy to participate under the leadership of Michele Bedard.
The call went out for donations the first Sunday in Advent and much to everyone’s delight the response was very positive, not only from parishioners of St Aidan’s and St Thomas, but also members of the community who learned about the initiative via Facebook. By Dec. 22, we had more than 100 gift bags assembled and delivered to Dempsey.
The women at Dempsey moved to that shelter in late November and are still adapting to their new environment, with the support of Cornerstone staff. We hope the gifts assured them in some small way that people were holding them in their heart this Christmas.
St. John, Antrim — Deanery of the Southwest