The Christmas Spirit

If you had to define the spirit of Christmas in one word, “giving” would be a great place to start. And if you looked up the word giving in Wikipedia, you might find a picture of Renate Wedel. Wedel died last December at the age of 81 in Frankfurt am Main. Wedel’s husband, Alfred, whom she’d moved with to the village of Waldsolms in 1975, died in 2014. Wedel’s sister, who’d been her heir, had already died as well. Which is why in April of this year, the Waldsolms town government got some surprising news: Wedel had bequeathed her entire estate of $7.5 million to the district. “I thought at first, this is simply not possible,” Waldsolms Mayor Bernd Heine told a local media outlet. “I thought a comma had slipped, something is not quite right.” Heine tells Hessenschau, the media outlet, the money will be put to good use, with possible plans to funnel it toward local infrastructure, education, and bicycle paths.

You may not be able to give millions, but you can be a generous giver. God loves a cheerful giver and what better time to give