I do not donate to "causes" except for one exception - Special Olympics.
Special Olympics provides year-round training and activities to 5 million participants in 172 countries. Competitions are held daily all around the world.
Eunice Kennedy Shriver believed that mentally handicapped people could be happy and lead meaningful lives. She founded the Special Olympics in 1963 to positively change attitudes to mentally handicapped people. She started a day camp called Camp Shriver at her home in Potomac, MD, and promoted the concept of physical activity and other opportunities for them.
The first Special Olympics Games were held on July 20,1968, at Soldier Field in Chicago. About 1,000 athletes from the US and Canada took part in the one-day event.
Every single person is accepted and welcomed, regardless of ability or disability. Their mission is to provide year-round sports training and athletic competition in a variety of Olympic-type sports to develop physical fitness, demonstrate courage, and experience joy.
Over 700,000 volunteers make the Special Olympics possible. Nearly 4 million athletes and Unified Sports Partners participate in Special Olympics. More than 3 million participants are people with intellectual disabilities who compete on the same teams.
Anyone over the age of 8 is eligible to compete. One-third of the athletes are age 22 or older. The Special Olympics holds competitions in every state in the US.
https://www.specialolympics.org/about/mission
https://www.specialolympics.org/about
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Olympics
https://www.specialolympics.org/what-we-do/sports/unified-sports
As a kid, my parents signed us up every year to give pony rides to disabled kids. We loved it, most of them were very brave getting up on a pony and loved it. We kids were responsible to lead our ponies around and the adult parent and one volunteer would keep the child steady on the pony. This is a great post!
That is so cool. We have something similar around here in operation. It's called Harmony Hollow where they let handicapped/intellectually disabled children ride the horses as a form of therapy. I have visited several times over the past few years.