Bruce and Jan Willson of Lewiston are well known to their neighbors for providing neighborhood support to families.

What started in 1986 as Hope House, a maternity home center and crisis pregnancy center, has grown and developed into Hope House Family Support Center.

For almost 25 years, the Willsons have been providing help to moms, offering free pregnancy tests, counseling women who have unplanned pregnancies, offering alternatives to abortion and support for practical needs.

“It is a volunteer-run organization,” Jan said. “Many of our clients become volunteers, giving back. We provide practical help in our thrift store with food, household goods, childbirth classes, parenting skills and prenatal care.”

“And last summer,” Bruce said, “we had a driver training class which was very popular.”

While most people may consider Hope House to be a center for unwed moms going through a time of crisis, the Willsons emphasize that their work is much more broad and comprehensive.

“We help with food, back-to-school things, Christmas toys,” Jan said. “We provided toys this summer to families who were going to celebrate Eid (the three-day Muslim holiday that marks the end of Ramadan) and to some people who wanted to put away some toys for Christmas.”

Moms can be overwhelmed with a new baby on the way.

“(We) provide practical help and an alternative to abortion,” Jan said.

Hope House also enables one-on-one support, counseling, and provides diapers, clothes for men, women, babies and children, household items to furnish their homes, over-the-counter medicines and vitamins, canned goods, boxed food items and, when in season, fresh produce.

“Though our clientele has tripled, our support base has not changed. This means we need help even more, but the support we get tells us that the community values what we do,” Jan said.

“We get help from Prince of Peace Parish. They are paying the heating for the small building again this year, as they have for the last three years. We get help from Walmart, and the Good Shepherd Food-Bank. Neighbors donate clothing and household goods. We have nurses, midwives and new resident volunteers.”

Bruce added that some of the new volunteers have come from Somalia, Ethiopia, Iraq, Morocco, Congo, Togo and Iran.

“We are excited to welcome new residents and they are some of our best volunteers,” Jan said. “They help with food distribution and the farmers market. They translate for some of our classes so that (Hope House) can be open to people who do not speak English very well, so there is no barrier.”

The survival of these families, despite the violence and tragedies they have experienced, has motivated the Willsons to begin yet another service to their neighbors. Next summer they will begin a recovery group for families that have experienced trauma.

“It’s amazing how they keep going and have joy in their lives,” Jan said.

“This summer we went to a birthday party for a 4-year-old Somali girl who should not have survived her early birth. At the same time, the family had just lost a family member from Mogadishu. They showed us the violence on the Internet. Here they were, celebrating their daughter’s birthday and grieving the death of a family member at the same time.

“These families have survived Kenyan refugee camps where people are starving. They are worried and live with anxiety, yet they cheer me with their big smiles,” Jan said. “It is sobering to think we have so many blessings and get in a grumpy mood at the least little thing, and they teach us, ‘You can rise above hardships in life and still have hope and joy.’”