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Mennonite Central Committee

CHOOSE THE MOST CONVENIENT WAY TO GIVE:

MAIL• Complete your gift selection on the enclosed

envelope. Indicate the quantity of cards you are requesting. Include a check payable to MCC or credit card information.

• Send to MCC by Monday, Dec. 7 to ensure that you receive gift cards in time for holiday mailing.

PHONE• Call toll-free 888.563.4676 to talk to an MCC repre-

sentative.

ONLINE• Go to mcc.org/christmas to choose your gift through

our secure online donation site.• When your order is complete, you will be given

access to downloadable gift cards, or feel free to call MCC to order cards.

WE CAN’T DO IT ALONEIn every country where MCC works, we partner with local churches and organizations with similar values. We are thankful for these partnerships that help make MCC’s projects as reliable, effective and efficient as they can be.

JOIN IN THE JOY OF GIVING

The projects and dollar amounts listed illustrate the difference your gift can make. Your donation will be used to fund various projects within the category of MCC’s work you choose to support. If donations exceed costs within a designated category, MCC will use contributions where they are needed the most. All Bible verses are NRSV (New Revised Standard Version Bible).

But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman . . . . (Galatians 4:4)

As you celebrate God’s gift to us this Christmas, honor family or friends with a gift that changes lives. Select your gift from the categories on the following pages. When you donate, you can request cards to send to your loved ones explaining the gift you’ve given in their name.

GIVE HOPE

$100 $200 $400 $800

THIS CHRISTMAS, GIVE A GIFT THAT CHANGES LIVES AROUND THE WORLD.

A gift of hope supports the breadth of the work described in these pages — making a difference where it’s needed the most. Through this gift, you are:

• helping MCC respond to urgent needs in often-forgotten places;

• bringing new opportunity to people around the world;

• partnering with MCC to give courageous people the tools they need to work for peace in their communi-ties.

Want a way to support food and education, to meet urgent needs and to build peace? Give a gift of hope, which supports MCC where needed most.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. (John 1:5)

Nataly Villarreal is part of an MCC program in Bolivia which provides meals and educational support for 120 youth, many of whom live in prison with a parent who is incarcerated.

GIVE FOOD

$600 new ways to grow crops $85 seedlings for

a large garden (12 trays) $25 helping youth

have access to land to farm

Conservation agriculture, which

MCC is promoting in Africa, Asia

and Latin America, includes using

mulch, as Stezen Mudenda is

doing in Zimbabwe.

YOUR GIFT HELPS FAMILIES HAVE ENOUGH TO EAT.Around the world, MCC is helping people overcome the challenge of growing enough food. From finding ways for vegetables to thrive in Jordan’s dry climate to helping farmers in Zimbabwe explore how they can use conserva-tion agriculture to grow more nutrient-rich crops, MCC is at work — making a difference in farmers’ fields and helping families have more to eat.

What will be on your table this holiday season? As you celebrate, you can help increase nutrition and give farmers better chances for a more bountiful harvest.

Through MCC in Guatemala,

Feliciana Herrera and other Mayan Ixil

youth are gaining access to land to farm.

Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above . . . .(James 1:17)

In Wadi Araba, Jordan, an MCC project helps women including Aisha Farhan, shown with husband Ibrahim, establish gardens at their homes.

$150 training for nonprofit staff $60 peace lessons

for young students $25helping religious

leaders work jointly for peace

GIVE PEACE YOUR GIFT SUPPORTS PEOPLE OF COURAGE AS THEY WORK FOR PEACE.MCC believes that God calls us to a life of peace and non- violence. Through this gift, you are giving people techniques to resolve conflicts in their own communities and to address injustices that can lead to violence. You are helping to build resilience and respond to psychological needs through trauma healing. And you are giving people the tools they need to choose peace over violence.

You can join MCC in partnering with peacemakers around the world.

And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds . . . . (Hebrews 10:24)

MCC trainings in Bangladesh help staff members of

various nonprofits gain skills to incorporate peacebuilding

into their organizations and programs.

In Chad, MCC brings

together religious leaders

such as Catholic priest

Paul Homine Ndouba and imams

Mohammed Youssouf Djarad and Abakar

Dara (background) to work for peace.

In areas of Honduras plagued by gangs and killings, an MCC project is equipping students to better deal with the violence surrounding them and to choose peace.

YOUR GIFT PROVIDES WATER FOR FAMILIES AND COMMUNITIES.Water is life, and having access to it transforms everything from people’s health to what they can grow. Clean water means fewer illnesses. A nearby water source saves families from spending hours a day hauling water for drinking, washing and cooking. Irrigation pipes or sand dams allow farmers to grow crops even during the dry season.

At home, your clean water is probably never more than a few steps away. Share this life-giving resource with others around the world.

$85 installing a hand pump for a well $30 32 feet of

pipe to irrigate fields $10 one bag of

cement for a a sand dam

GIVE WATER “. . . I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.” (Isaiah 43:19)

Lydia Pensar waters a garden she’s able to grow with water from a sand dam in Matambo, Mozambique.

Aisha Usani carries a bucket of water

from a well built through an MCC

project in Gurku, Nigeria.

In India’s Orissa region, irrigation

makes it possible for Maheshwar

Pujari and other farmers to grow

crops during the dry season.

YOUR GIFT GIVES PEOPLE NEW WAYS TO BUILD A BETTER FUTURE.Around the world, MCC livelihoods projects are changing families’ lives, expanding their income beyond what they could earn from crops or working for others. Projects target those most in need — whether reaching families affected by Agent Orange in Vietnam, giving widows an opportunity to raise goats in Kenya or providing sheep to Lebanese families in need.

You know how good it feels to start something new? Join MCC in giving that chance to families around the world.

GIVE LIVELIHOODS

$750 one cow for a family $200 a sheep

and a lamb $25 vaccinations

to keep goats healthy

Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us, even as we hope in you. (Psalm 33:22)

Through an MCC project in Vietnam, Tran Thi Nghia, who is not well enough to work in the fields, now is raising a cow.

For Ruth Seda in Kenya, raising

dairy goats and selling their

offspring and milk offers an

important safety net.

In Lebanon, sheep provide

milk and meat for families such

as Hamidan Mesmar and her

seven children.

YOUR GIFT BRINGS EDUCATION WITHIN REACH.In many places around the world, school is a privilege that families struggle to afford. MCC’s Global Family education program touches the lives of more than 45,000 young people, partnering with local schools and community leaders in more than 40 countries. Through MCC and your gifts, students with disabilities are getting the specialized education they need; women in Egypt are able, for the first time, to read the Bible for themselves or decipher their children’s medication; and orphans in Burkina Faso can afford primary and secondary education.

You can share the joy of learning.

GIVE EDUCATION For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Matthew 6:21)

IMPROVE EDUCATION — BECOME A GLOBAL FAMILY SUPPORTER

$300 a year $75 a quarter $25 a month

In Egypt, women such as Magda Samir,

shown with administrator Tolba Gad

Ekladios, are learning to read and write.

In Burkina Faso, Josue Koukouagou,

playing a plastic jug drum in a Christmas

celebration, and other orphans receive

school fees, clothing and medication.

In Mexico, MCC’s Global Family program helps Silvia Haythana Díaz Luna and other students with disabilities have access to specialized tutoring and play therapy.

YOUR GIFT MEETS URGENT NEEDS AND HELPS COMMUNITIES REBUILD.In times of disaster or crisis, MCC and its partners go to great lengths to respond. For instance, in MCC’s Nepal earthquake response, getting supplies to remote villages meant truck journeys as long as 10 hours — followed by hours of more travel on smaller trucks, tractors or motor-bikes, or people working together to haul supplies up steep mountain paths. MCC is known for working closely with local partners to meet needs quickly and for supporting long-term rebuilding that continues to bring hope months or years after a disaster has faded from the news headlines.

You can make a difference for the millions rebuilding their lives.

GIVE RELIEF Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. (Galatians 6:2)

Getting needed items to remote regions in Nepal required hours-long truck journeys and using people power to carry supplies up to steep mountain villages.

$200 shelter materials $80 food for a family

for a month $30 soap, towels and other hygiene items

In a time of drought, canned meat and

other food from MCC helped sustain

Marta Flores and others in El Salvador,

Honduras and Nicaragua.

In northern Iraq, food packages provided needed

relief to Jasem Mohammed and others who

fled Mosul, Iraq, after a takeover by the Islamic

State group.

YOUR GIFT GIVES YOUNG LEADERS NEW CHANCES TO SERVE IN THE NAME OF CHRIST.Through MCC programs such as International Volunteer Exchange Program (IVEP), Seed, Serving and Learning Together (SALT), Summer Service and Young Anabaptist Mennonite Exchange Network (YAMEN), young adults strive to model Jesus’ example of service. As they live, work and worship in new communities around the world, or in new roles in their home communities, they are gaining lead-ership skills they can use throughout their lives.

You can help build the future leaders of the church.

$750 serving and learning abroad $270 modeling

leadership at home $80stipend for an

international volunteer in U.S.

In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. (Matthew 5:16)

GIVE LEADERSHIP

Serving in Mexico through Young Anabaptist

Mennonite Exchange Network (a joint program

of MCC and Mennonite World Conference)

provided inspiration for Alexander Gutiérrez of

Bogotá, Colombia, to pursue pastoral studies.

International Volunteer Exchange Program (IVEP) 2014–2015 participants gathered at Camp Valaqua near Water Valley, Alberta, for a mid-year conference.

Tiara Downer, as an MCC U.S. Summer

Service worker at King of Glory Tabernacle in

the Bronx, N.Y., hosted community events.

THE JOY OF GIVINGThis Christmas, give a gift that changes lives around the world.

Pass it on!When you’re finished with this booklet, please share it with a friend.

To order more booklets for your family, friends, co-workers or church, email us at donate@mcc.org or call 888.563.4676.

Mennonite Central Committee U.S.21 South 12th Street, PO Box 500, Akron, PA 17501-0500717.859.1151

MCC Central States121 East 30th Street, PO Box 235, North Newton, KS 67117316.283.2720

MCC East Coast900 E. Howell Street, Philadelphia, PA 19149215.535.3624

MCC Great Lakes1013 Division Street, Goshen, IN 46528574.534.4133

West Coast MCC1010 G Street, Reedley, CA 93654559.638.6911

Call MCC toll-free 888.563.4676

mcc.org

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