Athen Elks #973 Helps Local Veterans At Time of Need
/Athens Elks Lodge #973 received an Elks National Foundation Freedom Grant for $2,500. This grant was used to purchase fifty $50 gift cards for our local veterans.
From right: Elks members Rich Russell, James Balding, and Tim Lairson, from local Veterans associations that will be distributing the cards, James Mitchell, Jim Koska and Randy Gray, and from the Elks Larry Copper.
Editor’s Note regarding this post
The Ohio Elks received the following letter of thanks from a Veteran who benefited from this charitable activity. To all Elks, keep doing the work you are doing. It is making a difference and impacting lives.
Thank you to the Athens County Elks, and the Athens Veterans Administration, who donated a PJ gift card to be distributed to Athens County vets. I just received mine in the mail.
Speaking for myself, and perhaps a few other vets who might not have access to a computer, this welcome and much appreciated surprise has not only fed my family for a day, but has also instilled a heightened sense of community within my home when such social cohesion has taken a major hit from the recent pandemic.
But this didn’t stop the Athens County Elks, who choose to push beyond and help local vets with the simple gesture of a gift card. They did so, not for the purpose of public media exposure, but rather, because it was a kind and generous act toward hometown vets. Such actions in helping vets, and on a larger scale over time, all in our local community, is based on the organization’s belief that showcases American patriotism at its finest. The Elk’s mission statement is worth celebrating each day when negative news coverage offers little to celebrate. In a nutshell, the Athens County Elks offer the type of brothers and sisters that I want to get to know better in the near future.
In a time that seems more chaotic than ever before, it’s important to embrace all that our U.S. Constitution represents, in part, “to ensure the blessings of liberty” for people of all races and political persuasions, where everyone (at least how I was raised) has a voice and a right to be heard and the merits of their ideas considered equally, without bias. There are also those who go beyond; those who strive to help build our country because it was, and still is, the right thing to do, based on Divine Law. Because, “In God We Trust” is just as important now as it was 220 years ago, and even as late as 50 years ago, when as a young teen I was learning the lessons of citizenship for merit badges that contributed to my Eagle Scout badge. Other than serving my country as a vet, that badge is one of my life’s greatest honors. Such training sticks to a man for a lifetime, as does citizenship and thanksgiving.
Some things may change in time, due to the foibles of the human condition, but others do not. This note of gratitude is one of them.
With sincere thanks,
Chris Batin