Ways to Give

Each year, Friendship Place runs a toy drive for the children in their care. Each child is asked to provide a wish, and this homeless services organization strives to fill them. We have claimed 25 children’s wishes and will display them on a Christmas tree on the stage in Chadsey Hall beginning this weekend. 

To participate, pick a child’s wish off the tree and buy the gift. Then bring it to Chadsey Hall and put it under the tree no later than Sunday, Dec. 7. Leave the gift unwrapped but attach the tree tag since this has a code number that will allow the case managers to identify which child it should go to. 

Questions? Contact Susan Price, CCPC’s rep to the Friendship Place Congregations Committee, 202-302-4226 or s.price@rcn.com.

This Advent season, our church invites you to participate in Gifts of Hope, our annual alternative gift market. Rather than buying traditional presents, you can make donations in honor of friends and loved ones to support organizations that bring hope and healing—both in our local community and around the world. This year’s Gifts of Hope will support:

Shepherd’s Table — A trusted community lifeline in Silver Spring providing daily hot meals, social services, clothing, eye care, and job training for neighbors experiencing homelessness, food insecurity, and poverty.

Solutions in Hometown Connections (SHC) — A Maryland-based nonprofit that welcomes refugees and immigrants by offering multi-generational English classes, citizenship preparation, early childhood education, and community-connection programs so newcomers can thrive and integrate.

Our Partnership with Shikokho, Kenya — Supporting teachers, student scholarships, a children’s feeding program, and—new this year—a solar water pump project bringing clean, sustainable water to the community.

Ayuda — provides legal, social, and language services to help low-income immigrants throughout Washington DC, Maryland, and Virginia access justice and transform their lives. The organization’s legal team represents these individuals before local immigration courts, the U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services, and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Since 1973, Ayuda has served more than 150,000 individuals. 

Join us each Sunday after worship from December 7 through December 21 in Chadsey Hall to make your Gifts of Hope selections and receive themed gift cards to share with loved ones. It’s a meaningful way to celebrate the season of giving while supporting those in need—near and far

Giving gifts is a dominant part of the Christmas season.   We especially remember God’s great gift of love to us when he sent our Savior, Jesus Christ, to live among us. In response, we too are eager to give back to Him and spread that love. Part of our Christmas sharing as Presbyterians is the Christmas Joy Offering.  

100% of the funds collected will be distributed to PCUSA and divided between the Assistance Program of the Board of Pension, schools and colleges equipping communities of color, and leadership development for people of color.

Half of our annual offering allows the national church to stand with our pastors and other church workers in their hour of need. The need for church workers and their families is real and growing.  The Presbyterian Board of Pensions provides critical financial assistance to eligible active and retired workers in the Presbyterian Church USA and their families.  Those funds help church workers with urgent financial needs, retired church workers with financial and housing needs, and pastors with vocational leadership needs.  

The other half of the Christmas Joy Offering provides scholarships and some basic operating costs to five Presbyterian-related colleges and one college preparatory school whose major emphasis is serving students of color. These institutions have provided quality education to people who have contributed immeasurably to the church at large and to the world. Students are educated for the professions of their choice in an environment which supports and nurtures racial and ethnic heritage. Many of the college students are the first in their family to attend college and come from low- to moderate-income families.