Your Donations Are Helping a Single Mom Raise Seven Children After Tragedy

In January of 2022, LCC received a request from Pastor Jim Buckman of Faith Lutheran Church in Lake Forest, Illinois, to help a single aunt of 6-year-old Damari Perry, found dead on January 7. Faith Lutheran Church has been supporting Delonya by raising funds for Damari’s funeral expenses and to help raise his four siblings for her brother, the children’s father. She is a single mother and a foster mother through Lutheran Social Services. Delonya has a powerful faith and compassion for children who need a loving, caring home.

Delonya is a single mom of two children of her own and a nephew whom she adopted. Her family of three children suddenly became a family of seven children. The year 2022 brought a lot of loss, sorrow, and adjustments for Damari Perry’s four surviving siblings and for Delonya and her three children.
 
Thank you to all who donated money, food, clothing, furniture, linens, household items, and school supplies for the family. Your donations, prayers, and acts of mercy, compassion presence and proclamation of Jesus helped this struggling family make it through the year.

Last Tuesday, LCC staff members Dianna Bonfield and John Pejchl had the opportunity to catch up with Delonya since early this summer when we delivered furniture to her small 3-bedroom apartment. This time we delivered handmade quilts for each of the children and an artificial Christmas tree, and boxes of lights.
 
Delonya shared that this was a hard year for everyone in the family. The children have been in counseling each week and have been adjusting well to all the trauma they have been through. All the children are doing well in school, and the after-school home life has become far less chaotic. Four months ago, she was able to move the family from the small 3-floor cramped apartment to a little more spacious 2nd-floor, 3-bedroom apartment. Once she is able to get legal custody of the four children, she will be able to move out to the suburbs, where she can have a house with a backyard.
 
Thank you for your prayers and your support as the family continues to heal from Demari's tragic passing.

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