A Mission to Comfort Children, Locally and Worldwide

Oxford parish ministry aims to give others faith, love, joy and hope through making rag dolls.

Story and Photos by Karen A. Avitabile

For the past six years, St. Thomas the Apostle Parish in Oxford has been helping to ease the pain of children in crises by creating a handmade rag doll to lift their spirits.

“We make rag dolls from start to finish that are given to children in crisis situations, whether it be health, family or environment,” says Nancy Schneider, founder and coordinator of the Church group called the Giving Doll Ministry. “In fall 2017, there was a natural disaster in Haiti and someone in the Church suggested we make dolls to give out.”

Schneider went to work. She learned of a local group from a condominium association that was already making rag dolls and those members connected her to the national nonprofit organization, “The Giving Doll.”

This Ohio-based group was formed in 2006 as a community volunteer project for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. The first-ever rag dolls were distributed to patients at St. Jude. Since then, The Giving Doll grew nationally and some 76,000 rag dolls have been distributed. Over the years, the organization increased its reach to include residents in nursing homes who receive “sunset dolls.”

At St. Thomas the Apostle Parish, Giving Doll Ministry members have donated rag dolls for use by parishioners, police and departments, hospitals, emergency medical technicians and nursing homes. Others have been delivered to patients at Connecticut Children’s Medical Center in Hartford.

In 2022, Giving Doll Ministry members donated rag dolls to the Ronald McDonald House in New Haven to honor people involved in the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting.

Church rag doll members use the pattern that was copyrighted by The Giving Doll organization. Over the years, material, lace, thread, stuffing and yarn for the rag dolls have been donated by the ministry’s members and parishioners.

Both male and female rag dolls are created and each one is presented with a coordinating blanket, a carrying pouch and a name to accompany the doll on its journey.

Giving Doll Ministry member Susan Baktis continues her love of sewing by making the outfits for the rag dolls. She learned how to sew in her home economics class in high school and enjoyed sewing clothes for her three sons while they were growing up.

Some members, including Jean Aulicino, have the job of “stuffing” the dolls. “It’s nice when you see the end result,” she says.

Diane Molleur has been a member of the Giving Doll Ministry for six years. “It is rewarding to help children,” she says, adding that members get attached to the rag dolls. “It’s hard to part with the dolls.”

On Mondays from April through November, the Giving Doll Ministry meets from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. in the basement of St. Thomas the Apostle Parish, 733 Oxford Road, Oxford. Anyone who can you sew a straight stitch on a machine, cut patterns, hand stuff or sew hair made from yarn to a rag doll is asked to join. For more information, call the parish office at 203.888.2382 or email limbo101@sbcglobal.net.