An Unusual Father’s Day:
While many families were busy celebrating Father’s Day on Sunday 19th June 2022, a group of 9 parishioners from Church of Our Lady Queen of Peace (QOP) comprising 5 young adults (QOP Youth) and 4 members from SSVP Conference of Queen of Peace arrived at the home of an SSVP Friend in Need, Mr A, with one single objective in mind.
Mr A, single and in his early 60s, had been living alone in a very small rented apartment and over time, had accumulated massive amounts of items which unfortunately also included a lot of junk. Unsurprisingly, this has resulted in an unhealthy and dreadful living environment, and to make matters worse, these terrible conditions has taken a toll on Mr A’s health without him realising it.
Grappling with ill health and completely overwhelmed by the sheer enormity of his hoard, Mr A reached out to QOP for help to clear his home.
The dark and cluttered apartment which would perhaps have been a cell of solitude and loneliness for Mr A on a regular Sunday suddenly became filled with life, activity, banter and laughter as the team set about to achieve their one goal to make Mr A’s home more liveable.
The youth went about with earnest, going through the apartment and filling bag after bag with items for disposal. Often, Mr A had to be persuaded to “let it go” as the youths cajoled him to part with his hoard by employing large doses of humour. Shrieks of ‘surprise’ could also be heard every time the friendly neighbourhood spiders and lizzies made an unwanted appearance, having popped out to say in their own way “Hi! How’ya doing ?”….
After almost 2 hours of hard work and sweat, the QOP team managed to declutter the front of Mr. A’s apartment and significantly cleaned out many parts of his apartment. It was amazing to see how much improvement was made during the short time as Mr A’s home was now brighter, cleaner and definitely safer with fewer health and fire hazards.
In retrospect, we hope that we had brought Mr A some joy for a very special and memorable “Father’s Day”; notwithstanding his single-status. Many thanks to QOP Youth’s Jacintha, Miguel, Aloysius, Anselm and Kassandra for their wonderful contribution. Although their fathers were not there to witness the work they did, we are sure they would have been extremely proud that their children have grown up to be kind young adults with so much love in their hearts, choosing to meaningfully spend their time and energy with a stranger in need, on Father’s Day no less.
For us from SSVP Conference of QOP, we also took away a very special Father’s Day. It was definitely not a typical Father’s Day with the usual gifts and feasting, but an extraordinary Father’s Day experience filled with the brightness of Christian charity.
