Give the gift of shoes & socks this Valentine’s Day

Dear Friends,

In less than one week, you put us more than half-way towards our goal of $1,632.16 (404 friends giving $4.04 each) in celebration of the 404^th anniversary of the founding of the Vincentian mission.  These gifts will be used to purchase new shoes and socks for school children and their hard-working parents in Vincentian missions.

Thank you to all our friends who have contributed.  You’re the best!

So, Valentine’s Day is coming up. And Lindsey (the wonder-worker who makes sure Facebook and Instagram and a half-dozen other things look good and work well) and I were talking about it in light of the pandemic and this Shoes and Socks campaign. She told me this story which was not only worth sharing but using—read on.

I (Lindsey) have a cousin who was thinking that things would be close to normal by Valentine’s Day. This would allow her and her husband to go out on a fancy date to celebrate. It has been sooo long since they had done something like this.  She was looking forward to dinner and dancing at a really nice restaurant.

Sounds lovely, right?

She was so excited about this she bought herself some top-of-the-line red stilettos and even fancier dress shoes for her husband! They were stepping out!

Unfortunately, as we all know, this isn’t a good idea right now. So, she pivoted to Plan B and is cooking a special dinner for them at home (wearing the red stilettos!).

While Lindsey was telling me this story (over Zoom, of course), we were scrolling through photos from our international missions looking at shoes, hard-working feet in beaten-up shoes as part of this Shoes and Socks campaign. And we got an idea!

So, here is a photo of the shoes Lindsey’s cousin bought for herself and her husband.

And here’s another of the shoes our brothers and sisters wear. Will you help us keep this Shoes and Socks campaign going?

You probably aren’t doing anything big this year for Valentine’s Day, are you? Let’s send a little love to people we’ll never meet. Let’s bring smiles to their faces.

If you’ll send us $4.04 (Yup, we’re still celebrating that anniversary!) we’ll make sure lots of folks get new shoes and socks. (Hey, if you’ve already given—feel free to give again.)

We are Vincentians. We do what Jesus did. We’ve been doing it for 404 years and we won’t stop—by God’s grace and with your help—until the work is done.

Please follow this link to give a little love today. Thanks. And God bless.

Fr. Mark (and Lindsey)