Mercy House

Changing the world one family at a time.

Twila W. Lee

Each year Mercy House asks the community to adopt our residents and aftercare families for Christmas.  Each year we are overwhelmed by the community’s generosity.  We have had many parents tell us that the best Christmas they ever had was at Mercy House; nothing before or after has met the Christmas dreams of their children.

We called Valley Mall to see if they could loan us a Santa to deliver the gifts.  They gave us names and telephone numbers.  Only one had his own suit and was willing to donate his time.  He, of course, was the real Santa.

During the commotion, Sue from Dominoes Pizza in Bridgewater slipped in with 24 pizzas to make it a real party.

Santa gave each child gifts and they all took turns sitting on his lap.  When it was time to leave, Santa gave a hug to our director and whispered, “Thank you, this is the best Christmas I ever had.”

Oh, Santa. This was the best Christmas for most of us.

Harrisonburg City Motorcycle Police escorted Santa as he rode in a police van.  Children were concerned that Santa was in trouble, but the Police assured them that Santa’s sleigh traveled way over the 25 mile speed limit so they had to bring him in a police vehicle.  The police stopped the traffic on route 42 while Santa opened the gate and strode up the sidewalk to clapping and shouts of joy.

This year, Mercy House partnered with Harrisonburg City Police to create the Snowflake Wishes Tree.  Generous community members went to the police department and took a snowflake from the tree, bought and wrapped the gifts and brought them to Mercy House.

A Mercy House Christmas