Best day of the year?  For some of us, it’s Thanksgiving.  Family, food, laughter, wonderful memories.  But for some of us, Thanksgiving is the worst.  It’s painful.  Because the memories are bad.

Many young mothers in crisis, as they turn to Good Counsel for help, actually dread Thanksgiving . . . dread Christmas . . . because the holidays remind them of a family that rejected them, maybe even kicked them out for refusing to have an abortion.  Some come from such harsh family backgrounds; they don’t have any joyful memories of the holidays.

So every year, as Thanksgiving approaches, their hearts break.

But your love changes this story.  Thanks to you, they have a loving family now.  Good Counsel is their family!  A warm, clean home for mother and baby.  Nutritious meals.  Medical attention.  Training and education.  The love of God.  Hope for the future.

On Thanksgiving Day, everyone will take part in preparing the feast: 56 moms in 6 homes.  There will be chatter and laughter—and noise!  You can imagine, with a total of 32 children, just how noisy and fun it will be!  A real celebration of life and love!

Yet someone will still be on the outside.  Somewhere, a mother will be panicking, despairing, lost.  Homeless.  Feeling desperate to provide for herself and her baby.  Nowhere to turn.  And by God’s grace, she will turn to Good Counsel.

For the sake of a frightened mother and her baby, I invite you to give a Thanksgiving gift today so I can open the door and say, “Welcome home!”

It was generosity from a friend like you that said “Yes” to a mom I’ll call Katie. . . .

She was a hard worker, and she saved her money as much as she could.  Then she was shocked to find out she was pregnant.  Unable to work, her savings began draining away – on visits to the doctor and the many other costs of prenatal care.  Soon there was no money for rent.

A friend in New York agreed to take her in, but after only three days, her “friend” kicked her out.  At night.  In the rain.  With nothing but a backpack.  Freezing, Katie sat on the front steps and broke down in tears.  “I was lost,” she remembers.

And then a passerby saw her, obviously pregnant and crying, and stopped to help.  He was a friend of Good Counsel.

He gave her Good Counsel’s helpline number – a connection that stays open 24/7 thanks to the giving of friends like you.  Katie called – a Good Counsel staffer picked her up immediately . . . and brought her home.

“It was a miracle,” Katie says.  Here was a loving family.  A place to belong and be loved.  Good Counsel, with your help, provided food and clothing, got her into pregnancy classes, then into school, helped her find a job, and provided childcare during work hours.

Katie’s baby boy will be one year old next month!  And she has saved enough money to look for an apartment.  “Thank you is not enough to say for me and my son,” Katie says today.  Her thanks go to you, as a faithful supporter of Good Counsel.

Now I urge you to please reach out again, by giving generously today.  By Thanksgiving I need $9,992 each and every day to care for every mother and child at Good Counsel.  I stepped out in faith to add Mary’s Shelter Gulf Coast to Good Counsel’s network of homes.  At that time there were just 2 moms; already, after 8 weeks, we’re over capacity, with 13.  The need was there, but no one answered the call.  Until God called you and me.

Any gift of love you give today will provide the diapers and the formula . . . food on the table . . . gas for the car, for trips to the doctor . . . utilities and all the everyday expenses of maintaining a home—multiplied by six!

The mothers will be so grateful for the second chance you’re giving them.  I’ll be grateful too.  Please let me hear from you right away.  God bless you!

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Peace,

Christopher Bell
President

P.S.  On Thanksgiving Day I’ll lead my own family in prayer, in the spirit of Psalm 75:2: “We thank you, God, we give thanks; we call upon your name, we declare your wonderful deeds.”  I’ll be thanking God for the wonderful deeds the Lord is doing through you . . . as you care for mothers in desperate need.  Thank you!