This is Channel 2 News at 5!
For New York City AIDS patients, many of whom can not even get out of their homes this Christmas,
a hot meal and a warm smile are the bright spot of their day.
Channel 2's Mike Taibbi tells us how an organization, called "God's Love We Deliver," lived up to
its name today.
In a gleaming SoHo kitchen, a few dozen volunteers prepare holiday meals for the homebound.
And there's nothing startling about that - service organizations and volunteer groups have been
doing it for years.
Yeah, now we're gonna get kickbacks!
But this is different because of people like John Jones and his friend Albert Kenbring,
and because of the homebound ill they're about to visit on behalf of God's Love We Deliver.
You see, John has AIDS.
He's in his seventeenth month of chemotherapy now, and he's not always up to getting up
in the morning.
What's today, today's Monday, Saturday I didn't have any energy.
And the people John and Albert are visiting with their meals and gift bags also have AIDS.
Only they're sick enough that they can't get out and fend for themselves.
People like photographer Bruce Cratsley, who almost died two years ago, but who had enjoyed
relative health and productivity since then, until last month.
It's been about six, seven weeks of not-so-good.
But I'm starting to feel better.
Does this help?
Oh, this helps!
Many, if not most, of the God's Love We Deliver volunteers do not have AIDS.
But for them, as well as for John and Albert, the disease at the center of this work touches
more and calls for more than a desire to do something nice on the holiday.
It calls for unconditional love, says Albert.
It calls for caring and empathy on a more intimate level than mere donations of money
or time.
God's Love saved my life.
Playwright Sydney Morris was not exaggerating.
He's a ten-year AIDS survivor who's endured meningitis and is losing his sight.
On one wall arranges photographs of friends and actors claimed by the disease.
He was ready to surrender two years ago, retreating to a back room of his apartment.
I wasn't eating, I really wanted to die, I thought I could never write again, and I thought
there was no sense living.
God's Love comes every day...
That's what they do - they carry their bags and knock on doors.
Nine hundred doors a day and 2 meals delivered for Christmas.
Kids make the bags - the cards made from the best ones have done a quarter million in sales.
And the kitchen volunteers are a small army now, but at base level, this is what it is.
People who understand each other and each other's needs, making each other feel better.
We just knew that, by the end of the day, we want to make a difference.
I don't know if I believe in God, but I certainly believe in angels, and so I thank God's Love
We Deliver for the angels with the brown paper bags.
In Manhattan, Mike Taibbi, Channel 2 News.
Well, God's Love We Deliver started six years ago, serving clients in Manhattan.
Now the group runs meals to homebound AIDS patients in all five boroughs, including two
hundred children.
Good evening, and Merry Christmas everyone!
I am Howard Thompson, Jack has the night off.
Warm and generous New Yorkers delivered the goods once again this holiday season.
For many of the city's homeless, a hot meal was served with a warm smile.
Don Lark has this story.
This is Melanie Fallon.
She is one of four hundred volunteers who began their day at 6 AM.
They are home-delivering a special holiday this Christmas to homebound people with AIDS.
The AIDS organization called God's Love We Deliver prepared seventeen hundred meals today.
Volunteers include the executive chef at Lutece.
All this, is, I'm working here in New York City, I've been cooking for a lot of wealthy
and healthy individuals, and I think it's time for me to start helping people who are
less fortunate and have less luck.
I lost my son five years ago to AIDS.
And he was on the program for three months.
And I saw what a worthwhile organization it was, and I've been helping ever since.
The program delivers meals five times a week to people with AIDS.
Christmas includes flowers and presents.
I'm overwhelmed.
I'm happy, y'know, that somebody really thinks about me still.
I have no family thinkin' about me, so I'm very blessed to have y'all.
Uptown, hundreds and hundreds of homeless people and several dozen volunteers feel the
same way about sharing Christmas dinner today at the Sheraton New York Hotel.
And I'm grateful for the dinner, and that was special because it's his first Christmas.
It give me a chance to give back somethin' to, y'know, give back to the community and
it keep me in touch, too.
How was dinner?
Excellent.
Best, best we ever had yet.
Sorry Giuliani didn't come and help us, celebrate it with us.
Mayor Giuliani is normally here, but he sent late word he had to cancel.
For those who did attend and those who volunteered, their Christmas was more special for the experience.
At the New York Sheraton, I'm Don Lark, Channel 11 News at 10.
The 10 O'Clock News starts now!
While we celebrate this Christmas, thankful for what we have, surrounded by those we love,
there are those surrounded by emptiness, consumed by loneliness, who need a giving hand on Christmas.
But as Fox 5's Eric Lasser tells us, God's Love We Deliver is a group that delivers love
and more.
Jill, Jodie, and Harry are on a mission of mercy today.
They are among the dozens of volunteers for God's Love We Deliver.
Six days a week the organization delivers hot meals to homebound men, women, and children
with AIDS.
People like Patrick Daniels, who considered God's Love a godsend.
It's very important to me, it's, it's, it's just, it's hu- , it's humane.
We don't seem to know what that word means anymore, do we?
And on Christmas day, the folks at God's Love We Deliver pull out all the stops.
Today's meal is a four-course dinner complete with a holiday gift bag, hand-painted by various
schoolkids.
Volunteers say it's a labor of love.
Well, Christmas is a time of giving, and what could be more giving than to give up yourself
and to give a tremendous meal to somebody who needs it?
Somebody who's hungry?
But perhaps more important than the food or the gifts, God's Love We Deliver delivers
dignity.
On Christmas Day, each recipient gets not one, but two meals, so that they too can enjoy
the spirit of giving.
This day of the year they can turn to their closest friend or care partner and say, "Come
over to my house and have shell steak with portobello mushroom sauce."
We brought you some gifts, we brought...
And for people like Patrick Daniels, that is the greatest gift of all this Christmas
- a renewed sense of pride, of faith, of life.
The "Oh God, I'm blind, I'm alone, I'm poor, I'm this, I'm that," well, no, you're still
alive, for heaven's sakes!
Get crackin'!
And I do!
In Greenwich Village, Eric Lasser, Fox News.
And God's Love We Deliver is a completely voluntary organization serving nearly nine
hundred people a day in the New York and New Jersey area.
For more infomation >> News Brief, 08/01/2018, 5 p.m. update - Duration: 1:34. 
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