Charities, organizations and churches make special efforts to ensure underprivileged families do not go without during the holiday season. For those families who cannot afford presents to give to their children on Christmas morning, parents can look to the Church of St. Gabriel in Marlboro, NJ for a helping hand during this Christmas season.

In addition to the enormous amount donations St. Gabriel receives from parishioners and community members for families in need, there is a special project just for the children. Every year in the front hallway of St. Gabriel’s Church stands a large Christmas tree decorated with colorful ornaments made out of paper. Written on these ornaments is the name of a child and what they would like to receive from Santa Claus this Christmas. After mass, families interested in donating a gift to a child in need take their paper ornaments off of the tree. The ornaments are chosen at random and you are permitted to take as many as you like.  The gift is to be wrapped and put under the tree at the church before Christmas Eve.

“It feels nice to give back to the community during the holidays,” said Tina, a parishioner of the church. Tina encourages her whole family get involved by making each member of her family pick a child to buy a gift for. “It is a good feeling know that you are making a kid smile on Christmas morning.”