Ask Me About Lions

And this is what I will tell you:

Some people feel called to make a difference in the world around them. We put aside our political and religious differences and work together to serve need where we find it, without regard for personal gain. We call ourselves Lions, and we belong to the world’s largest service organization, with 1.3 million members in over 200 countries and geograpical areas.

For over ninety years, the men and women of Lions Clubs International have been active in meeting the needs of our communities. While our signature projects are related to sight conservation — preventing blindness and the conditions that cause it — we also feed the hungry and shelter the needy. We respond to natural disasters, with relief supplies and cash in hand. We provide eyeglasses and hearing aids to children and adults who can’t afford them. Last year, In California alone, we provided over $5 million worth of eye surgeries free of cost to children and adults in need.

Around the globe, we have saved the sight of 27 million people since 1995. We are working to save the sight of 37 million more by 2020. Our work promotes international understanding and creates conditions that foster peace. In a 2007 special report, Corporate Citizenship and Philanthropy, the Financial Times ranked our Lions Clubs International Foundation as the top non-governmental organization in the world, as rated by our many collaborative partners.

As with all good works, charity begins at home. We start by improving the lives of our neighbors. Are you one of us? Do you hear a call to meaningful, life-changing community service? If so, we need you! For information on membership, visit our international web site.

IF YOU LIVE IN OR NEAR MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIFORNIA, consider joining the Silicon Valley Lions Club of Mountain View. We are already hard at work, donating backpacks filled with school supplies to needy Mountain View students, and offering free screening clinics to help identify those at risk for blindness. We participate in local community events, like Thursday Night Live, and the city’s Health and Wellness Fair. We volunteer for the local Soap Box Derby. We are always looking for other ways to serve. Come help us change the world, starting right here at home. Contact me by email or telephone at (650) 720-5679.

Lions International Purposes

  • To Organize, charter and supervise service clubs to be known as Lions clubs.
  • To Coordinate the activities and standardize the administration of Lions clubs.
  • To Create and foster a spirit of understanding among the peoples of the world.
  • To Promote the principles of good government and good citizenship.
  • To Take an active interest in the civic, cultural, social and moral welfare of the community.
  • To Unite the clubs in the bonds of friendship, good fellowship and mutual understanding.
  • To Provide a forum for the open discussion of all matters of public interest; provided, however, that partisan politics and sectarian religion shall not be debated by club members.
  • To Encourage service-minded people to serve their community without personal financial reward, and to encourage efficiency and promote high ethical standards in commerce, industry, professions, public works and private endeavors.
Lions Code of Ethics

  • To Show my faith in the worthiness of my vocation by industrious application to the end that I may merit a reputation for quality of service.
  • To Seek success and to demand all fair remuneration or profit as my just due, but to accept no profit or success at the price of my own self-respect lost because of unfair advantage taken or because of questionable acts on my part.
  • To Remember that in building up my business it is not necessary to tear down another’s; to be loyal to my clients or customers and true to myself.
  • Whenever a doubt arises as to the right or ethics of my position or action towards others, to resolve such doubt against myself.
  • To Hold friendship as an end and not a means. To hold that true friendship exists not on account of the service performed by one another, but that true friendship demands nothing but accepts service in the spirit in which it is given.
  • Always to bear in mind my obligations as a citizen to my nation, my state, and my community, as to give them my unswerving loyalty in word, act, and deed. To give them freely of my time, labor and means.
  • To Aid others by giving my sympathy to those in distress, my aid to the weak, and my substance to the needy.
  • To Be Careful with my criticism and liberal with my praise; to build up and not destroy.