The Compassionate Service Party

For Valentine’s Day 1991, women in the Westlake Ward, Cleveland Ohio Stake, sent out expressions of love motivated by the Relief Society motto, “Charity Never Faileth.”

These expressions of love, which touched many other lives, were items donated or created at a compassionate service party during their February homemaking meeting.

Fifty sisters, including five women of other faiths, responded to the invitations to come to the compassionate service party. Each brought something to be donated to a shelter for abused women. Each sister also brought a nonperishable food item to be donated to a food bank organized by the pastor of a local Presbyterian congregation. Seventy-five cans of food were collected.

The women spent the evening preparing messages on large hearts to be sent to individuals in military service, writing letters to ward missionaries, and making five hundred valentines for dinner trays at four area nursing homes. They also made terry cloth bibs to be donated to a home for the handicapped and tied quilts for babies at the women’s shelter.

Their efforts were well received in the community. Both the pastor of the Presbyterian church and the executive director of the Catholic-run home wrote to express their thanks. “I cannot tell you how important this gift is to us,” wrote the director of the home.

The sisters found the experience so rewarding that, with approval of the stake presidency, stake Relief Society president Janet Gee arranged for the sisters to tie more quilts for the women’s shelter during their September homemaking meeting. Sisters from the North Olmsted Ward Relief Society were also invited to participate. At this meeting, canned food was gathered for the food bank, and three more crib quilts—previously pieced and sewn by Merrie Miss A class members—were tied and finished, then donated to the women’s shelter.—Gladys Osborne, Sheffield Lake, Ohio

Quilts and canned goods were among the offerings of love given to a women’s shelter by sisters from the Westlake and North Olmsted wards. (Photography by Phil Shurtleff and Janet Gee.)