Your session will time out at [00:00]. If you would like to sponsor [Child Name], please complete your transaction as soon as possible.Unfortunately your session timed out at [00:00] and since that time [Child Name] was sponsored by another person. Please visit the Sponsor a Child page to find another child.
You can change your automatic withdrawal information through the Payment Methods section of your My Compassion account or by calling our office. Thank you for supporting Compassion.
Sponsorship plus Urgent Needs provides funds for additional benefits for sponsored children, their families and communities that cannot be provided by child sponsorship funds alone. While sponsorship funds provide activities which directly benefit your sponsored child, the extra $10 from Sponsorship plus Urgent needs is used to fund initiatives and programs which sow further into the lives of Compassion assisted children, their families and communities.
As Compassion raises more funds for these activities, we will be able to assist more sponsored children with these additional benefits.
Some of these include:
Emergency medical care
HIV and AIDS Initiative – includes education on prevention as well as care
Education and training programs for parents of sponsored children
Partner church development – including church partner staff training
Compassion’s holistic child development program activities take place at church-based child development centres. Sometimes activities take place in the church building or the church may have another facility designated for the child development centre. Each centre is within a 30-minute walk of the homes of the children it serves.
Program activities vary in detail according to the culture, environment, or needs of the area where the individual centres are located. However, there are common elements in all Compassion child development centres which ensure that all Compassion-assisted children are given the greatest opportunity to be released from spiritual, economic, social, emotional and physical poverty.
Each child development centre:
Meets on a regular basis.
Uses the facilities of the local church partner through which the program operates.
Provides a programmed curriculum of activities for registered and sponsored children.
Has a committee which provides local accountability and support.
Has a director employed by the church to manage the day-to-day activities.
Employs staff and volunteers selected by the local church.
Operates under Compassion International’s carefully monitored standards and guidelines.
Provides reasonable levels of safety for children relative to the realities of the surrounding community.
Donations can be made by pre-authorized withdrawal (bank account or credit card), internet banking, telephone banking, Interac online, cheque or money order. These withdrawals can be made monthly or annually. Pre-authorized donations are safe, easy and convenient. Pre-authorized withdrawal from your bank account is our preferred method of payment, as it saves Compassion hundreds of thousands of dollars each year in transaction fees. Automatic withdrawals can be setup by calling our office or by mailing in your information to us at Compassion Canada, PO Box 5591, London ON, N6A 5G8. Cheques made out to Compassion Canada will be accepted, as will money orders. Unfortunately deposits can not be made directly into Compassion’s bank account.
Online – you can submit a photo through the letter section of your My Compassion account. Just above the box where you can type out your letter to your sponsored child, there is an “Upload a Photo” button. Use it to select the photo to add to your letter. Once you are ready to send the letter, click on the “Send Letter” button
Printed Photos – If you want to send in a physical copy of a photo, simply include it in the mail with your next written letter. It is helpful if you can write your supporter number and the child’s name and number on the back of the photo. Please do not include any photo descriptions as these will not be submitted for translation.
Christmas is one of the most special times of the year for sponsored children. For many, Christmas is the only time they receive gifts. The Christmas Gift Fund provides an age-appropriate Christmas gift for every child registered with Compassion. These gifts include clothing, blankets and bed-linen, toiletries, practical items and, of course, a range of toys. Funds are pooled internationally and equally distributed amongst all Compassion-assisted children, including those who do not yet have a sponsor. Compassion Canada suggests sponsors contribute an amount of $25 per child to this fund. Each sponsor has the opportunity to send a special Christmas card to the child they sponsor, which can be written online through your My Compassionaccount or sent via mail.
You can easily donate to Compassion Canada through internet banking. Just like adding a payee for paying bills, search for Compassion Canada and use your supporter number as the account number. Your supporter number will start with an “8-,” and be followed by 8 digits.
Depending on the bank you may need to omit the “8” or the dash. If your donation is for anything other than sponsorship—such as Urgent Needs, Christmas Gift Fund, etc.—please provide instructions in the notes section.
Presently, we work with Royal Bank, Scotiabank, TD Canada Trust, Bank of Montreal, CIBC, Canadian Western Bank, Citizens Bank and Credit Unions located in the provinces of British Columbia and Saskatchewan.
Compassion exposure trips are an exciting opportunity for you to have a safe yet rich cultural experience while allowing you to see our work firsthand and visit your sponsored child. When we’re travelling to your sponsored child’s country, you will receive a personal invitation by email to travel with us and see for yourself how your sponsorship is impacting your child’s life. We promise, when you return from this adventure, you will never look at the world the same way.
Check your My Compassion account to see if we have the correct email address on file for you.
No less than 80 percent of your donation goes to ministry activities, including all expenses that occur within the country your sponsored child is from, which directly benefit sponsored children. Children and families do not receive cash but instead are recipients of goods and services, carefully designed, delivered or purchased according to their needs. Independent and internal audits of our work are conducted to ensure donor support is being used efficiently and with integrity.
Compassion Canada’s financial statements are available online at Financial Statements .
We want to see children grow and flourish in all areas of their life – spiritual, physical, cognitive and social-emotional. Through sponsorship we can help make that happen. Each child is linked with one sponsor that contributes $41 a month to ensure that their sponsored child receives healthcare, education, food, clothing, vocational training, social, emotional and spiritual care. These benefits are provided through activities run through the church-based child development centre.
Please do not respond. While communication via social media might seem to save time and money, the risks this channel presents overshadow the potential benefits.
Compassion does want you to have the best relationship possible with your sponsored child, but we cannot guarantee everyone’s safety if we are not aware of what’s being communicated. While we trust that those who sponsor with Compassion are doing so out of a love for Christ, we have an obligation to protect the children in our care from sponsors who may not have the child’s best interests in mind. Because of this, we must be aware of what’s being communicated to ensure the child’s well-being.
Here are some additional factors we’ve considering when creating our letter only communication guideline:
It’s not uncommon for someone who knows a child is sponsored to create an account on a social network and posing as that child, contact his or her sponsor asking for money. In this situation, the child may be facing the threat of physical harm if the money is not provided.
We cannot protect your privacy or your sponsored child’s if we are not involved in the correspondence.
By serving as the conduit for communication between you and your sponsored child, we are able to watch for any content that may be inappropriate or culturally insensitive – no matter how well intentioned or innocent a comment may be.
Should you receive a friend request or a message from anyone claiming to be your sponsored child on Facebook or another social network or through any medium other than your letters from Compassion, please do not respond but rather contact us immediately at info@compassion.ca or 1-800-563-5437.
You can send a birthday gift onlineor by contacting our office. Birthday gifts can be between $15 and $150 CAD. Your financial gift to your sponsored child is greatly appreciated as it brings joy and help to ease the struggles of poverty.
Yes, Gifts of Compassion donations are tax-deductible. A charitable tax receipt for all donations made in a calendar year (excluding donations made through Text to Give or an online fundraiser, which are receipted separately) will be issued no later than February 28th of the following year.
In addition to your monthly sponsorship donation and encouraging letters, you may wish to send gifts to your sponsored child. We are delighted when sponsors decide to provide additional support. We do not mail parcels because delivery in developing countries is unreliable and expensive, but you are able to send paper items like stickers, posters and colouring pages.
We also provide an opportunity to send a monetary gift. The options are: Birthday Gift, General Gift, Family Gift or Child Development Centre Gift. Child Development Centre staff assist children and their families to ensure funds are used appropriately and to discuss how to best use the gift to benefit the child and family. If you have a specific gift in mind, we will forward your suggestion, but ultimately the child or their family will make the final decision.
Within your My Compassion account you can track the status of your gift (on the “Gifts” tab available on your sponsored child’s record).
Once the gift has been delivered, you should receive a follow-up letter from your sponsored child acknowledging your gift and how the gift money was used. Please remember that each letter may take a few months to come through for translation and delivery. Please check the date of your child’s letter to work out whether he or she would have received your gift before they last wrote back to you. Many times, the children aren’t writing to you on the same day that they receive your gift, rather they reply on a scheduled day when all the children at the centre write to their sponsors.
If you are in doubt whether your sponsored child has received your gift, you are welcome to write and ask or contact our office.
If you are fluent in the language your child speaks, please feel free to write to them using that language. Otherwise, please write in English. Please include an English version of the letter as well, as all letters are scanned at our headquarters in accordance with our child protection policy before they are couriered weekly to our country offices. Writing in your child’s language will mean one less letter for the Compassion staff to translate. However, it will not speed your letter to your child as we are unable to separate individual letters from the packages. Unfortunately, it is not possible to arrange for your letters not to be translated into English as our colleagues across the world deal with hundreds of letters everyday and are unable to single out individual letters. However, you will also receive the original letter written in their language, which you will be able to enjoy reading.
Our three distinctives make us who we are: We are Christ-centred, child-focused and church-based. We partner exclusively with local churches to implement our programs, because we believe the Church is the most effective in reaching its neighbours. Our holistic child development program is focused on developing children in every aspect of life—physical, social-emotional, cognitive and spiritual. And we do it all in Jesus’ name! We believe that transformed people will transform families, communities and nations, which is why we give children the opportunity to be rooted in Christian community at a local church, where they experience God’s transforming love and have the opportunity to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Learn more about what makes Compassion different from other organizations.
