It’s not everyday that you get your own personal weather forecast. But on Monday afternoon, well-known UTV weather presenter Louise Small interviewed me for the television news on the first day of the Black Santa sit-out.
And she gave me my very own Black Santa weather forecast for Tuesday. “Cloudy but dry first thing, then rain moving in from mid-morning, heavy at times.”
Her forecast was perfect. The early morning was cloudy but dry. But by midday the rain was falling steadily on Black Santa and his helpers.
Dean of Belfast, the Very Rev Stephen Forde, during his Black Santa sit-out at St Anne’s Cathedral. Pic: Presseye
Except that, with the warning of the weather forecast, Black Santa’s helper had erected a sturdy gazebo to keep Black Santa, his helpers and the new electronic card machine all dry from the elements.
With our shelter from the rain we were fortunate.
But what of those who have been displaced by wars in such places as Sudan and Gaza?
What happens when it rains heavily on those living in tents, or sheltering under flimsy tarpaulins of plastic sheeting?
Black Santa returns for its 48th year to raise money for charity
In Africa’s newest country of South Sudan, thousands have fled from the horrors of a brutal war in the country of Sudan to the north.
But South Sudan experienced unusually heavy rainfall this summer. The baked red earth turned to a sea of red mud. Tarpaulins and shelters made from grass, give protection from the sun, but not from heavy rain.
And in Gaza the driving winter rains have soaked through tents and bedding and clothes.
What has this to do with Black Santa?
It is because, through the agency of Christian Aid, a portion of the money collected for the Black Santa Appeal will be used across the globe, through local partner organisations, to provide better shelter against the winter rains and storms, and a way of surviving the seeping mud which is the winter reality of every refugee camp.
And what of those in our city or the towns of our province, who have no place to sleep, but out of doors in tonight’s rain and cold? What of those, who though skilled, have no work because they have no address to call home?
In the rain, those local charities working to prevent homelessness, and working with those who find themselves homeless, they too will receive support from the Black Santa Appeal.
Your Christmas generosity giving shelter from the rain – whenever it is forecast at the end of the News.