Parish of the Good Shepherd

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Do you love me?" ...“Feed my sheep." ~ John 21:17
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Part of your walk as Christians is to be of service. Christ taught and demonstrated this time and again. It's not always about pleasing yourself. It's about taking action and loving others. If you love your neighbors as yourself you will gladly help them in their need.

 

Also we gave toiletries including many shopping bags and boxes of those necessities collected at the back of the church that the Sunday School kids sorted and counted for the Hunt Center. Thanks to everyone involved we boxed and bagged 220 “big items” (soap, toothbrushes and paste, deodorant, shampoo, shaving cream) and 90 disposable razors! 

 

In April, 2011 a donation was made in the name of the Church of the Good Shepherd for the amount of $250.00 to the George Hunt Center which sent this reply "Your generosity and support of our mission to the homeless help provide hospitality, resources and a refuge from life on the streets..."

 

Early In May, 2011 we took a vote of the Sunday congregation and sent

$250 to Episcopal Relief for the tornado victims in the USA.

On Sunday, May 22nd, 2011 the Outreach Committee met and after discussion made the following donations in the name of the Church of the Good Shepherd:

$250 to Crossroads RI for their work with the homeless;

$200 to Hope for Haiti to support nutrition clinics for severely malnourished children;

$200 to the RI Community Food Bank which gets food to so many pantries and meal sites;

$150 to the Blessing Way which helps those released from prison get a better start;

$100 to the RI State Council of Churches which advocates for the forgotten needy.

 

With school budgets getting tighter we help to make a difference for the Winters School across the street from Good Shepherd through our special summer outreach program we call Tools for School. The request from our teacher contact at the school was for us to supply pencils (any kind), single subject spiral notebooks, glue sticks, crayons, copy/printer paper and, of course, any other basic school supplies we could find at a bargain price during the summer back to school sales. We also supplied boxes and boxes of tissues for all those little runny noses. Some of us who were not up to shopping made donations so that others who had the time could do the shopping for us.

 

On September 15th, 2011 the Outreach Committe voted to contribute an additional $250.00 to the George Hunt Center and voted again on Oct. 23rd, 2011 to contribute $250 to the Good Neighbor Energy Fund, providing warmth to families in need; for every dollar given the energy companies will reciprocate with various matching programs.

 

Thanks for every contribution of food and money for the Thanksgiving baskets prepared by Harvest Hope Church of God in Christ for distribution at Good Shepherd. The office phone was almost disabled when the Salvation Army began to refer folks to us; that's the enormity of the need. We had $500 from the Advent Fund on hand for Stop & Shop gift cards, and we used your cash donations and other funds to add $300 which meant we bought 80 $10 cards.

 

Thanks, too, to the kids at the Winters School who arrived on Wed., Nov. 23rd, 2011 with boxes and bags of non-perishable food to help restock the shelves.

 

Where did these donations come from? Past fundraisers and continuing special gifts from the faithful people and dear friends of Good Shepherd.

 

The 2011 financial report from the Outreach Committee tells us where the outreach money comes from and where it goes. While money is essential for outreach to continue, we always have to remember that outreach = reaching out to people!

 

Outreach has many faces and sounds:

 

• See 6 or 8 adults sitting on the Broadway stairs of Good Shepherd, laughing and just hanging out waiting for the doors to open for Fun Friday

 
• Watch 2 boys grab their favorite game and head to a table to play Connect 4 while a mix of adults and young girls are excited to make Easter baskets. (The boys will make baskets, too, when they see candy!)
 
• Be surprised when a rather scruffy looking man gives you a smile as the line passes by the servers at St. George’s Soup Kitchen and you ask if he wants salad; then he offers thanks
 
• See eyes light up when you give them a choice for dessert at St. George’s
 
• Hear the folks from Harvest Hope Church of God in Christ tell how they were overwhelmed with food requests at Thanksgiving, BUT managed to give everyone who appeared a turkey or a $10 Stop ‘n Shop card plus a bag of groceries
 
• Stand in line for a bag of food when you know you’ve got little on the shelf at home
 
• Watch out the window at the May Fun Friday and see the smiles as gardeners prepare their plots for growing
 
• Hear the 1st time gardeners tell about harvesting green beans
 
• See the piles of school supplies as the Sunday School kids sort and tally this valued collection

 

• Hear a teacher tell a 1st grader that the new crayons are for her to use


We usually don’t see our outreach that involves our sending a check in the name of the Church of the Good Shepherd, BUT there are real people who benefit :
 
• the homeless who have to leave a shelter at 7 am in January get warm at the Hunt Center
 
• the Blessing Way reaches out to a woman whose poor choice landed her in the ACI but is now trying to make a new life for herself and her kids
 
• hear the sounds of children enjoying a meal at a center in Haiti
 
 
Sometimes our outreach responds to what we’ve seen on TV - the tornado in Joplin, Missouri .
 
Once in a while we have a unique opportunity presented to us and when she returns in August, we’ll hear from Esther Anderson about the Good Shepherd Water for Life well in Liberia and the people helped.

 

There’s lots of good news, but there are also concerns as we go forward :

How can we best use our limited funds in a time when every agency helping people scrambles for $$?
Can we add new volunteers to our existing group to prevent burnout?

                                             

A reminder: The Outreach Committee concerns itself with both projects that involve many volunteers and projects that involve only our financial support, but this is not all of the outreach of the Church of the Good Shepherd. There is Trash & Treasure, the good works of the Episcopal Church Women, the Sunday School collection for the Heifer Fund and Souper Bowl Sunday, the ongoing collection of “Box Tops for Education” which helps put books in the library of the Winters School, continued support for the Episcopal Charities Fund, and ministry supported by the Advent Fund. Our apportionment; a sizable part of the budget of the parish goes to the Diocese of RI and through the diocese to the Episcopal Church for ministry beyond our small corner of the Episcopal Church.