DRAPER, Utah — Ten-year-old Josie, who attends Corner Canyon Church in Draper, knows the excitement she feels opening a Christmas present, and she wants to make sure someone else gets that chance.
Josie was filling a shoebox with toys, school supplies and hygiene items, and that box may reach someone on the other end of the globe, like Christy, who grew up in the Middle East.
“I received my box at the age of nine," she said. "My teddy bear that I pulled out, actually, I looked at it and I looked at its eyes and I went It has its eyes on straight. You could go anywhere in my country and not find a teddy bear with its eyes on straight.”
Every November, churches, schools and businesses in Utah gather shoeboxes filled with crucial items for children in over 100 countries. It's part of an international initiative called Operation Christmas Child.
“Most of those countries are afflicted with poverty, disease, war, famine," said Karolen Weber, a year-round volunteer in the Salt Lake area for Operation Christmas Child, "Children in these countries, they have so very little, and for many of them, this will be the first gift they've ever received."
Weber said last year around 80 churches in the Salt Lake area participated in the project, but this year, stakes feel higher with rising costs.
“For a lot of the children in these countries, school supplies are critical," Weber said. "They have to supply their own school supplies in order to attend school. If you are in a family that is struggling financially, finding the money for those school supplies can be quite a bit of a hardship.”
Religion plays a big role in the boxes, especially the message of giving back, which is why Christy has come full circle and is a speaker with Operation Christmas Child.
”I knew they made such a huge impact all over the globe," she said. "I was just dropping off shoeboxes with my own family, and I dropped them off, and I just happened to say, 'Hey, I got one of these when I was little,' and the volunteer went,'You did.'"
Children like Josie keep the cycle going.
“It doesn't mean some of us are higher than others and other ones are lower," she said. "We should help everyone."
National Collection Week runs from Nov. 16-23.
For more information on donations and drop-off locations, you can visit this link.