Faith in Action creates caring intergenerational connections through Family Friends, a program that pairs volunteers with children and families who have special needs. We enlist volunteers to befriend children with a disability or chronic health condition and their families, promoting the physical, social and emotional well-being of everyone involved. 

Volunteers spend time playing, reading, and building skills with children. While the pair plays, the child’s caregiver is given time to rest or take care of things around the house and yard.

Volunteers will:

•  Experience something new and rewarding while sharing from a lifetime of valuable experience

• Enrich their own lives through friendship with a child and family

• Put feet to their personal values through neighborly outreach and service to another

• Promote learning and sharing through unconditional friendship

• Feel the satisfaction that comes from helping another

• Enhance their own health by staying active and involved in their community

Volunteers are caring men and women who have a heart for children and have a little extra time to give each week.

We serve children who face extraordinary challenges in their young lives related to a chronic health condition or disability. The are children age 0 to 16 who make accommodation for a special need and who would welcome a friendly visitor.
 

Contact Kathy Watson, Program Coordinator, at the Faith in Action office at 503-537-1546 or by email at kathleen.watson2@providence.org.

Volunteers complete a volunteer application, interview and health screening, provide personal references, and receive a criminal history check.

Families and children complete a brief intake application, interview and home visit by the program coordinator.