Pride Group Sends Over 35,000 Letters of Support to the LGBTQ+ Community for the Holidays (Exclusive)

For some members of the LGBTQ+ community, the holidays can be a lonely time if they're struggling with feelings of rejection from family members. One group is trying to ease that pain with a simple gesture: sending letters to let them know they are loved and appreciated just as they are.

This year, the Pinta Pride Project has assembled more than 800 letter writers from across the country to send out cards, letters and drawings to members of the community who have asked to be included.

"A lot of these people are estranged from their families and feeling really alone," Carolyn Pinta, who founded the non-profit organization, tells PEOPLE.

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A note or card can be an effective way to counteract that emotion. "It's a very personal thing to receive a handwritten card," says Pinta, who has gotten requests from an array of people seeking support, including a man who was subjected to conversion therapy, a woman whose family disowned her after her daughter started transitioning and a man who said his Christian housemates "don't accept me."

Pinta started the project out of her Buffalo Grove, Ill., home in 2022 to raise awareness and support for the community after her daughter came out as bisexual in seventh grade.

"Her father and I do it in support of all the kids who don't have support like she does," Pinta tells PEOPLE.

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During the first year of the letter-writing campaign, non-religious holiday cards of love and affirmation were sent to about 2,100 people. This year, letter writers are mailing more than 35,000 missives, she says.

The effort has spread so widely that one letter is even going to Sarah McBride, the Democratic politician from Delaware who recently made history by becoming the first-ever openly transgender person to be elected to Congress.

McBride was recently the target of a bill introduced by South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace, which would prohibit transgender people from using bathrooms, locker rooms and other single-sex facilities at the Capitol and other federal properties nationwide that don't correspond with their biological sex.

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Getting holiday greetings in the mail, even from strangers, can be truly uplifting, says Bert Smith, who lives in Austin, Texas.

"I held off on opening them until the day I really needed it, and that day came this past weekend, when I made the difficult decision to go through the closets and sort through my late husband's clothing," Smith says.

"It was so much more draining than I thought it was going to be, but what got me through it? Opening cards," Smith continues, adding the letters have, "given me so much peace."

Smith adds, "it cannot be understated how much it has meant to me."

Read the original article on People