I am thinking about Family today, so it’s only appropriate that I share our annual Christmas photo with you. I am so blessed with a wonderful family. This photo has become a tradition. Each December my daughter Erin and her husband Rob allow me to take my three grandsons to see Santa. Afterwards, the family, including my son, Uncle Patrick, pose with Hunter, Colin and Johnny outside Santa’s house. It is a very special time for me.
You undoubtedly have your own family traditions and we hope this season has been a blessing for your family as well. But today I want to write about my entire family — thousands of them!
When we started the Foundation more than four years ago, our then-founding Director, MaryEva Candon, urged me to insert the word “family” into our name. Now, having a long name my entire life, I thought it would be cumbersome to add another word into our name, but I listened to my friend and counsel and accepted her suggestion. So we became the John S. Mulholland Family Foundation.
Little did I know, that “family” would take a whole new meaning. You see, our family has grown by the tens of thousands in four years. When you think of the tens of thousands of people who have contributed cans of food at their church, school, or place of business — when you think of the hundreds and hundreds of volunteers at the collection and receiving ends of our operations — when you think of hundreds of board members and corporate and individual donors who ensure our success — when you think of the hundreds of families we serve — our family has grown quite large.
No one could have envisioned the success we would achieve in such a short period of time. This time last year, for instance, we had three pantries; today we have five. We started our fifth year this month by opening our fifth pantry! We thought we would serve 20 families our first day, but planned (just in case) for three times that number and served 51 families! Proves that neighborhood really needed a pantry. What a wonderful Christmas for that neighborhood, in the shadows of the U.S. Capitol and Nationals Stadium.
585,00+ cans of food, 26+ tons of fresh food later, we’re really only making a dent in the hunger crisis in Washington. But it is our dent. Washington continues to have one of the highest food insecurity rates in the nation, one of the highest costs of living, and no improvement in sight. We started serving several dozen families a month; now it’s 800 families each month! And we are going to be there until we’re no longer needed.
My Father always taught me that God has a plan for everyone. I am grateful His plan at this time in my life is to have me serve the working poor every day. And I am glad that that He gave me you to help me along the way.
Happy New Year!
