Cross Catholic Outreach President Michele Sagarino joins the Catholic Morning Show to explain how Box of Joy turns a shoebox-sized gift into a child's first experience of Christmas. She shares how parishes, schools, and Knights of Columbus councils can sign up as group leaders before the October 30 deadline, and why every box includes a rosary and the story of Jesus. Michele also previews a milestone: one million Box of Joy gifts delivered since 2014, as Cross Catholic Outreach marks 25 years of relief and development work.
Michele Sagarino, president of Cross Catholic Outreach, joins Bo Bonner with 99 days left until Christmas and a global gift operation already in motion. Michele explains how the Box of Joy program began: as the ministry worked in dozens of countries providing water, housing, and food, staff realized that nearly every child they met had never experienced Christmas at all.
Michele walks through how simple participation is. Individuals and groups — parishes, Catholic schools, Knights of Columbus councils, youth groups — raise their hand as group leaders, and Cross Catholic Outreach ships them the boxes and brochures they need. Families fill each box with small gifts like toys, t-shirts, water bottles, sunglasses, a deflated soccer ball with a pump, or stuffed animals. Every box that comes through the clearing center receives a rosary and a story of Jesus, so children understand that the true gift is the Lord. Boxes are distributed in eight countries, typically gathered with a local priest, sister, or bishop and paired with a message about Christ's love.
She also gives an overview of Cross Catholic Outreach itself, a Vatican-endorsed Catholic relief and development nonprofit now celebrating its 25th anniversary. The organization works in more than 30 countries and has delivered close to $5 billion in aid across more than 90 countries since its founding, partnering with bishops, priests, and religious already on the ground for water projects, housing, food, schools, vulnerable children, and disaster relief — material aid delivered alongside spiritual support.
Group leaders need to sign up by October 30. Iowa currently has ten participating groups, and Michele's hope is to push that to fifteen. Sign up and find everything you need at BoxofJoy.org, and learn more about the wider ministry at CrossCatholic.org.
Heard on the Catholic Morning Show, weekdays at 7 a.m. Central on Iowa Catholic Radio. More at IowaCatholicRadio.com.
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