Members of the Oshawa Ward in the Oshawa Ontario Stake of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints worked side by side with their Muslim neighbors to package food for those in need in their community.
More than 120 volunteers of all ages filled the Oshawa Ontario Stake center on Nov. 26 for the Light the World “United Hearts and Hands” activity. Working in two shifts for a couple hours at a time, they packaged 8,100 pounds of food.
“It was a huge success,” said stake communications director Lisa Whitsitt. “Everyone who came and volunteered loved it.”
A Church humanitarian grant allowed the supplies to be purchased from GlobalMedic in Toronto, and the completed boxes of food were donated to Feed the Need in Durham, which services more than 70 food banks in the region.
Missionaries and members of the Oshawa Ward attended, along with Muslim volunteers from Masjid-e-Ayesha in Whitby and the Durham chapter of the Islamic Circle of North America.
Whitsitt said the volunteers were pleased to help those in need in their own community, in addition to serving with their neighbors.
“The goal was to interact with one another and to work together on this project,” she said. The Oshawa Ward began growing their relationship with the Muslim community a few months prior, when the bishop’s wife was invited by a friend to an open house at the local mosque. Whitsitt went with her and met some of the leaders.
They talked about doing a service activity together, and came up with the idea to package and donate food.
“We called this event ‘United Hands and Hearts’ because that was one of our goals, to spread a little kindness and light throughout our community by uniting together,” Whitsitt said. “This united effort was a wonderful way to ‘Light the World.’”
Ontario requires high school students to do a certain amount of community service hours before they graduate. The activity became a way for teenagers to get those hours. But beyond just showing up, Whitsitt said the youth volunteers “were super hard workers and really loved it. They were very engaged and very busy.”
In the weeks before the activity, ward leaders ordered the Church booklets titled, “Muslims and Latter-day Saints: Beliefs, Values, and Lifestyles,” to hand out to both faith groups.
The Durham Region newspaper covered the event, quoting volunteer Khudsiya Quadri who was there with her family.
“It’s very important for us to show our kids that we are part of this community and we will be always here for each other,” she said. “It doesn’t matter which religion we are, we are neighbors and we are supposed to help each other, in sickness, in health, in happy times and sad times.”
