Alternatives to the Samaritan's Purse shoebox appeal

Every year we receive complaints from humanists and other members of the public that their workplaces, schools or other associations are collecting gifts for the evangelical US organisation Samaritan's Purse.  The gifts are distibuted under the charity's "Operation Christmas Child" shoebox scheme.

Evangelical literature is added to the boxes (or given "alongside" the boxes) and in the UK this is often unbeknown to the donors or even to the organisers of collections at individual places of work or education.  Local newspapers in particular seem to applaud local involvement in the scheme and uncritically promote Operation Christmas Child ever year, despite widely available criticisms.

See below for more detail on the criticisms levelled at the Operation Christmas Child shoebox scheme.

The BHA recommends that concerned individuals draw attention to the evangelical nature of this appeal (which is not always evident and which people of other religions and none may prefer not to support) and suggest positive alternatives to their colleagues, teachers or bosses.

Positive alternatives

Though humanists object to the covert evangelising of Samaritan's Purse, they do not object to giving.  In 2004-5 we collected from BHA members suggestions of more inclusive and secular charities that offer a direct alternative to the Samaritan's Purse shoebox appeal.  Charities working abroad usually prefer donations of money which they can spend locally, but some of these below do have the attraction of collecting things (particularly appealing to children).  Others have very tangible ends, and some of them would make good gifts from one humanist to another.

Gift boxes

We used to recommend the shoebox scheme run by 21st Century Child at www.21stcenturychild.org/shoebox_appeal.html.  In May 2007, however, 21CC decided to "take a break" and now advise that shoebox donors might instead look to the charity Link Romania at www.linkromania.co.uk/shoebox-appeal because "they don’t place any literature in the boxes and promise not to discriminate in who the boxes are given to".

The Aquabox scheme at www.aquabox.org is a popular charity amongst humanist groups and many schools.  Welfare items from a recommended list are collected to fill a water treatment box, which costs £50.00.  This then becomes a useful kit that can be sent quickly to disaster areas.  Each box is numbered and linked to the donor, so that you can find out where your box went.

Other Gifts

Plan UK at http://gifts4life.org offer a range of 'gifts for life' to assist some of the world's poorest children.

Via Oxfam, you can buy someone a flock of chickens or a camel, or textbooks or dinners for a third world school. For these and many other life-changing or life-saving gifts, see www.oxfamunwrapped.com.

Good Gifts is a means of getting suitable gifts to people who really need them, endorsed by a range of worthwhile charities. Buy a goat for Rwanda or a bicycle for a midwife in Cambodia or help turn weapons of war into farm implements, via www.goodgifts.org.

The environmentally conscious can adopt an animal from an endangered species via www.wwf.org or a whale or dolphin via www.wdcs.org. You can protect an acre of rainforest at www.worldlandtrust.org, or www.rainforestfoundationuk.org. Closer to home, you can sponsor a tree through www.woodland-trust.org.uk. All these send certificates to mark the gift.

There is, of course, the annual Blue Peter appeal, which is always carefully chosen so that virtually any family can contribute something. Keep an eye on www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/bluepeter for this year's appeal.

Other ideas

If you work or attend a school which is looking for an alternative, you might want to link your school with one in South Africa, Ghana, Uganda or Malawi!  Visit www.lcd.org.uk/uk/lsp/ to find out more.

See also the Make Poverty History website at www.makepovertyhistory.org for suggestions of how to continue the campaign to end world poverty begun in 2005.

 

More details on criticism of the Samaritan's Purse Shoebox Appeal

On the face of it, the Samaritan's Purse Operation Christmas Child shoebox appeal is a benign initiative simply intending to give gifts to needy children at Christmas time.  However, as pointed out on the website Operation Chistmas Child Alert:

Whilst American Evangelicals are mostly aware of the nature of OCC, this is not the case at least in the UK, where the presentation and information leaflets are quite different and the level of evangelism is downplayed in OCC's presentation to the public.

On the one hand OCC protests that the evangelism is almost incidental, and argues that it has removed the missionary literature from the boxes themselves – now including it "alongside" shoeboxes sent from the UK.  But on the other hand, various pieces of correspondence and their continued downplaying of the missionary work indicate that the evangelial element, targeted quite specifically at non-Christian families for the purposes of conversion, is an ongoing and primary priority of Samaritan's Purse.

The site Operation Christmas Child Alert by an anonymous campaigner documents an attempt to get hold of the missionary literature.  This includes correspondence from Samaritan's Purse to a "concerned supporter of OCC", in which an employee of Samaritan's Purse in the UK writes:

Please be assured that the commitment of Samaritan's Purse to evangelism is as strong as ever. [...] Samaritan's Purse staff in the U.K. is dedicated, as we all are, to ensuring that Christian literature given by donors is used in effective ministry outreach to children through Operation Christmas Child.

The Gospel is also presented locally as part of the distribution of the gifts, and wherever possible, children are offered a Gospel storybook written in their own language called The Greatest Gift of All. Many children are also invited to enroll in a 10-lesson follow-up Bible study program, and upon completion receive a New Testament as a graduation gift.

In the United States, Christian literature remains inside the shoebox gifts given by donors. We are developing and implementing standard operating procedures to ensure that this practice is followed in the U.K. and other sending countries.

After following a circuitous trail in search of the evangelical material handed out alongside British donors' shoeboxes, the anonymous author of Operation Christmas Child Alert finally attains a copy, and is able to conclude that the literature is:

of very poor educational value, devoid of critical thought, carries a fundamentalist message and is carefully written to engender conversion in the young and naive.  It comes complete with a “sinner’s prayer” of conversion and a religious pledge card.  None of these overtly evangelical parts were copied to me or the General Adviser (RE and SACRE).

See also a rundown of the booklet including images and links to a downloadable PDF file.

See www.pursestrings.ca for a similar picture from a Canadian perspective.

It is perhaps important to note that opposition to Operation Chistmas Child comes also from religious quarters.  Dr Giles Fraser, vicar of Putney, attacked Operation Chritmas Child in a 2003 piece for the Guardian newspaper: The evangelicals who like to giftwrap Islamophobia.

what many parents and teachers don't know is that behind Operation Christmas Child is the evangelical charity Samaritan's Purse. Their aim is "the advancement of the Christian faith through educational projects and the relief of poverty". And a particularly toxic version of Christianity it is. [... ]

It's run by the Rev Franklin Graham - chosen by George Bush to deliver the prayers at his presidential inauguration - who has called Islam "a very wicked and evil religion". Graham, the son of the evangelist Billy Graham, is from the same school of thought as General William Boykin, US deputy undersecretary of defence for intelligence, who described America as waging a holy war against "the idol" of Islam's false god and "a guy called Satan" who "wants to destroy us as a Christian army".

It should be noted that Franklin Graham's language with reference to Muslims is reflected in his description of Hindus as "bound by Satan's power" (in his book Rebel with a Cause).

Giles Fraser goes on:

What is most resented about Samaritan's Purse is the way it links aid and evangelism. "We have no problem with people going into a country to do evangelical work," said Hodan Hassan, a spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "But when you mix humanitarian work in a war-torn country with evangelisation you create a problem. You have desperate people and you have someone who has food in one hand and a Bible in another." [...]

What is astonishing is that Christian fundamentalists have managed to persuade millions that their warped version of Christianity is the real thing and that mainstream churches have sold out to the secular spirit of the age. The truth is quite the reverse.

US evangelicals employ a selective biblical literalism to support a theology that systematically confuses the kingdom of God with the US's burgeoning empire. It is no coincidence that the mission fields most favoured by US evangelicals are also the targets of neo-conservative military ambition. [...]

Schools and churches that are getting their children involved in Operation Christmas Child need to be aware of the agenda their participation is helping to promote. There is, of course, a huge emotional hit in wrapping up a shoebox for a Christmas child. But if we are to teach our children properly about giving, we must wean them off the feel-good factor.

 

BHA involvement

The BHA has regularly joined the criticism of Operation Chistmas Child issuing press releases on the subject and advice to members and supporters since 2002.  The pressure of criticism prompted the Charities Commission to act in 2003 by investigating and eventually criticising Samaritan's Purse.  Our most recent communication follows below.

November 2006

BHA asks members and supporters to remind parents, schools and other groups of the evangelical nature of Samaritan's Purse

Children all over the country have been bringing home shoe-boxes this month to fill with toys and presents for children in need in Africa and Eastern Europeas their contribution to the charity "Operation Christmas Child". But how many parents and children know that their contributions are funding a massive conversion effort by evangelical Christians?

On their website, Samaritan's Purse say of Operation Christmas Child that "Wherever it is culturally appropriate and in partnership with our local partners, we make a booklet with Bible stories available to children in their own language." But an email from a representative of Operation Christmas Child passed to the British Humanist Association (BHA) casts doubt on this claim, and has raised fears that the charity is misleading schools and parents, who will inadvertently find themselves funding religious proselytising around the world. In the email, it is made clear that the evangelical literature is distributed wherever possible:

"We are blessed to be able to report that over 95 percent of the shoe box gifts which we distribute are given out with literature in the child's native language.

"Unfortunately, in a small number of countries we are unable to distribute literature along with the boxes for the safety of those who distribute the gifts.   These men and women live and work in the countries where we distribute the boxes and in places closed to the Gospel, this can involve taking on great risks to their personal safety in order to be involved.   We hope you can understand the reasoning behind why a small percentage must be given out without literature, but even in these cases, we trust that the Lord can still work through our overseas partners to bring children and families to Himself."

Samaritan's Purse has the subject of controversy in the past (see below), when the head of the organisation, the American evangelical minister Rev Franklin Graham, branded Islam "a very evil and wicked religion" and in 2003 when the Charity Commission wrote to the charity for information on its fundraising activities in light of the revelations that no reference had been made by them to the fact that they included evangelical literature with the parcels put together by children in British schools.

The BHA is again encouraging the many parents who contact us for advice about Operation Christmas Child to take the matter up with their schools. One parent who has done so, Dave Pearson from Lincolnshire , has called on other parents to do the same:

"Any parent who wants their child to learn about helping others, and who wants their school to be part of that learning process, needs to info rm their head teacher of the true nature of Samaritan's Purse if the school is supporting Operation Christmas Child.

"Don't be afraid to speak out. The head teacher of my child's school was horrified and appalled by the history and central aims of Samaritan's Purse – they were delighted that I'd brought this to their attention. In future years my child's school will still be supporting an aid organisation, but will be doing so with the dignity of the recipient in mind."