You might have seen the great initiative from the National Basketball Association that has stars such as Kobe Bryant and LeBron James doing more than dunk a basketball...but lend a helping hand in their local communities. 

This year, for the first time, the Coptic Orthodox Youth Basketball League decided to do the same! The "COYBL CARES" campaign launched this season. Partnering with FTFT!, players and coaches from New York and New Jersey are putting down the basketball to hit the streets and show the love of Jesus Christ to those who need it most! Players, coaches and servants are going out and serving pizza to men and women who are homeless in New York City! God is blessing the efforts of these young men by showing weekly fruit! Tears of repentance are a familiar sight...hearts are changed, spirits are lifted, and GOD IS GLORIFIED! 

A diocese-wide service initiative will be started from today. Each church will place a box in the church to collect canned food, clothes and toiletries.

Contact the FTFT! Delegates from your individual church for details.
Then, on September 26th we will go out as o1ne unit and distribute the items we collected to local shelters and soup kitchens in our communities. (each church will go to a shelter nearest to it)

We will then all meet afterwards for prayer and fellowship and share the joy we experienced in this day!

we will be meeting at 5 pm in Archanel Michael and St. Mena's Church in Staten Island, NY.

The most important things for now are the following:
1) place a large donation box somewhere in your church
2) announce to your church to bring in the desired items (canned food, clothes, toiletries) encourage sunday school children to donate items so they can learn the joy of giving and service!

*if you would like to participate in this service day and your church is too far away to join us for our post-service meeting, PLEASE feel free to just go ahead and serve! We encourage you to spend the next two months collecting those items with your church and go out and distribute them on september 26th(or another day if you need to)

What: July FTFT! Delegates' Day!

Why: We had a great response to FTF50 but some of you couldn't make it
because of various church celebrations of Pentecost. So we're having
another one just for you!

The angels proclaimed the news of Christ's resurrection to the women saying, "Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but He is risen" (Luke 24: 5-6) The news of the risen Christ brought tremendous joy to the disciples, but terrified the Jewish leaders.