Westchester Community Church Benefits Children with Cancer

In the spirit of giving, the parishioners of Westchester Community Church in Westchester are helping children and teens fighting cancer. The Mission Group recently sponsored a toy and gift card drive to benefit the Pediatric Oncology Treasure Chest Foundation (POTCF), a non-profit organization that provides comfort and distraction from painful procedures to children and teens diagnosed with cancer. When the last gift card came in, the parishioners donated more than 280 toys and $525 in gift cards.

Westchester Community Church parishioner Marge Nelson said, “We believe in the cause. We hope the toys and gift cards bring some happiness to the lives of these children.”

Treasure Chest Foundation CEO and Founder Colleen Kisel expressed her profound gratitude for the generous support shown by the Westchester parishioners. “The Treasure Chest Foundation is especially grateful to Westchester Community Church for their enormous donation of toys and gift cards,” said an appreciative Ms. Kisel. “It is wonderful to see the giving members of this church come together to help little ones whose lives have become filled with doctors, nurses, surgeries, pills, chemotherapy, radiation and mostly painful, painful procedures.”

The POTCF is a unique organization whose services impact more than 13,300 young cancer patients enduring 20,000 clinic visits each month in 19 states across the nation. Nowhere else in the nation does such a program exist. Colleen Kisel founded the organization in 1996 after her then seven-year-old son Martin had been diagnosed with leukemia in 1993. Ms. Kisel discovered that giving her son a toy after each procedure provided a calming distraction from his pain, noting that when children are diagnosed with cancer their world soon becomes filled with doctors, nurses, chemotherapy drugs, surgeries and seemingly endless painful procedures. Martin celebrated his 26th anniversary of remission from the disease in March.

If you would like further information about the Treasure Chest Foundation, please contact Colleen Kisel at 708-687-TOYS (8697) or visit the Foundation’s web site at www.treasurechest.org.