Weather dampens turnout for mission’s Happy Birthday, Jesus, Party

Rain cut into the crowd for the Modesto Gospel Mission’s Happy Birthday, Jesus, Party on Friday, at which attendees received a free Christmas dinner and gifts.

“It was really pouring earlier,” said mission Executive Director Kevin Carroll. “God bless these people who stood out there since 6 in the morning” for the event, which began at noon and continued to about 4:30.

Mission volunteers put up about 15 8-by-8-foot pop-up canopies, “so we were able to cover a lot of the people most of the time,” Carroll said. But when rain and wind got heavy, folks got wet.

The Yosemite Boulevard mission gave away about 1,700 gifts and fed the same amount of people, Carroll said. At evening meal Friday, about 150 more people were fed.

“Last year, we fed about 2,000 people and passed out about 2,400, 2,500 gifts,” he said. This year, the Salvation Army also held a giveaway Friday, Carroll said, so that event may have cut into the mission’s attendance a bit.

This story was originally published December 23, 2016 at 7:23 PM with the headline "Weather dampens turnout for mission’s Happy Birthday, Jesus, Party."