![\"Santa](\"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/images\/21-1228-s2p-cos-santa-696x522.jpg\")
PHOTO CAPTION: Santa and friend at the Scientology Volunteer Ministers tent in Mayfield, Kentucky.<\/em><\/p>\n
Santa, who drove to Mayfield from the Church of Scientology of Nashville<\/a>, was not prepared for the kind of reactions he got.<\/p>\n \u201cDozens of children came by today,\u201d said Santa. Some kids were too shy to come up to him, but others were eager to see what he had for them. \u201cI think the parents were even more excited than the kids.\u201d<\/p>\n He would keep pulling things out of his bag until he got the reaction he was looking for.<\/p>\n \u201cFor one little boy, about 3 feet tall, I pulled out a stuffed horse. No interest. I pulled out this two-foot plush octopus half the size that he was, and he was elated.\u201d<\/p>\n For the boy\u2019s sister, Santa found a giant tie-dyed frog.\u00a0\u201cShe gave it a huge hug as soon as it came out of the bag.\u201d<\/p>\n Sometimes, standing in the street, he\u2019d see people driving by looking so downcast. \u201cI\u2019d wave at them and say \u2018Ho Ho Ho!\u2019 and they couldn\u2019t help but smile.\u201d<\/p>\n A retired Marine donated hundreds of toys for the children\u2019s table in the Volunteer Ministers tent \u201cso the kids would have Christmas.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s like everybody is helping everybody,\u201d he said, wiping tears from his eyes. \u201cIt\u2019s the best Christmas I\u2019ve ever had. In the state of the world these days, out of all this chaos, to see what people are doing to help each other instead of stepping on each other, there\u2019s hope for mankind yet. It\u2019s been an experience. I hope I never see anything like this again, but to live through it and to see what it has done to people, and people helping each other \u2014 there\u2019s more good coming out of it than bad.\u00a0It\u2019s been a Christmas like no other. It ain\u2019t about the toys, it ain\u2019t about the stuff you get. It is about what you can\u00a0do. It\u2019s been fulfilling.\u201d<\/p>\n In addition to the toys and serving a special dinner for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, the Volunteer Ministers, working with other charities, have served more than 30,000 meals to local residents and volunteer workers.<\/p>\n More trained Volunteer Ministers are needed. Anyone who can join the disaster response should contact the Volunteer Minister hotline at (800) HELP-4-YU or (323) 960-1949.<\/p>\n The Church of Scientology\u00a0Volunteer Ministers program<\/a>\u00a0is a religious social service created in the mid-1970s by Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard.<\/p>\n A Volunteer Minister\u2019s mandate is to be \u201ca person who helps his fellow man on a volunteer basis by restoring truth and spiritual values to the lives of others.\u201d Their creed: \u201cA Volunteer Minister does not shut his eyes to the pain, evil and injustice of existence. Rather, he is trained to handle these things and help others achieve relief from them and new personal strength as well.\u201d<\/p>\n Learn more:<\/p>\n – https:\/\/www.scientology-ccnashville.org\/<\/a><\/p>\n
![https:\/\/www.Send2Press.com\/300dpi\/21-1228-s2p-cos-santa-300dpi.jpg<\/a><\/p>\nPhoto caption: Santa and friend at the Scientology Volunteer Ministers tent in Mayfield, Kentucky.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MAYFIELD, Ky., Dec. 28, 2021 (SEND2PRESS NEWSWIRE) — Scientology Volunteer Ministers came from across the country to help a town destroyed by the 10 December tornado celebrate the holiday. Santa, who drove to Mayfield from the Church of Scientology of Nashville, was not prepared for the kind of reactions he got.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8949,"featured_media":77789,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[596,12804,524,608],"tags":[17408,16300],"class_list":["post-77800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-global-aid-news","category-ap","category-kentucky-news","category-religion-news","tag-kentucky-tornadoes","tag-scientology-volunteer-ministers","has-post-title","has-post-date","no-post-category","no-post-tag","no-post-comment","has-post-author"],"acf":[],"views":4168,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8949"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77800\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.send2press.com\/wire\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}](\"https:\/\/www.Send2Press.com\/300dpi\/21-1228-s2p-cos-santa-300dpi.jpg\"){kind=link}