Christmas Cards for Soldiers

I recently saw this posted on a friend’s FaceBook status:

When filling out Christmas cards this year, please take the time and send one card to this address: A Recovering American Soldier, c/o Walter Reed Army Medical Center, 6900 Georgia Avenue, NW Washington DC 20307-5001. If we pass this on and everyone sends one card, think of how many cards these wonderful, brave and special people, who have sacrificed so much, would receive! Please repost on your wall!

I thought, “Aw, what a great idea.” Yes, the sappy sentiment “Awww” did go through my head. Anyway, I wanted to post it here to pass along to my non-Facebook friends. Well, before I pass along ANY type of information, I do a little research first to check on its validity and authenticity. Unfortunately, this isn’t a valid request or even as good of an idea as it seems.

Now, I’m not a believer in Snopes being the end-all-be-all authority on everything, but the site did make a good point as to why this idea won’t work:

“The US Postal Service will not accept mail address to ‘Any Soldier,’ ‘Any Wounded Soldier,’ or the like because if it did, it could be providing a conduit for those who might do harm to armed service members.”

Walter Reed Army Medical Center officials evidently echoed these sentiments in a statement released a couple of years ago when the request was circulating through e-mails. You can read the entire article Cards for Recovering Soldiers, on the Snopes website.

The Snopes site did offer an alternative: Red Cross sponsored Holiday Mail for Heroes.

More details are found at the Red Cross website, but here’s the mailing address for cards for soldiers:

Holiday Mail for Heroes
PO Box 5456
Capitol Heights, MD
20791-5456

Please, be sure cards are postmarked by Friday, December 10, 2010 and check out the Red Cross site for more information.

Thanks for stopping by! And when you’re addressing your Christmas cards this year, address one for an American soldier. Even if you don’t believe in what our military is doing, that soldier believes in you and what you’re doing and risks his/her life so that you may continue to have the freedom to do it.

Grace and peace be yours in abundance,

Betty