St Andrew’s Church is getting ready to launch a new mission partnership!
Background
Back in 2019, a suggestion was made to link St Andrew’s with a community in a developing country. For all sorts of reasons (we can’t blame the pandemic any more) such as a departing vicar and curate, both of whom enthusiastically supported the suggestion, a vacancy, a full PCC agenda and changes to the Mission and Outreach Committee membership, it finally got the green light earlier this year.
World Vision
Thanks to a local existing and well-established, connection, it was agreed that linking with the charity World Vision was the way forward.
The charity was founded on a prayer 70 years ago in response to the situation of Vietnamese refugee children and has been working with communities, donors, churches, partners and governments to create opportunities for better futures for vulnerable children of all backgrounds living in the world’s toughest places. In a recent BBC report about the plight of starving children and their families in Afghanistan, it was World Vision who were shown distributing food parcels to desperate families.
It is most well-known for its child sponsor ship programme. This allows individuals and/ or families to sponsor a child in an area where WV is already at work. When a child is sponsored he/ she receives some help, for example for school books or shoes, but most of the money from the monthly sponsorship goes to the community in which WV is working and helps to fund, for example, healthcare, water supplies, repairs or improvements to school buildings, parenting classes, farming tools, after-school reading clubs, under the supervision of the WV staff on the ground.
The Churches in Partnership (CHIP) programme is an innovative programme, and we should be excited to get on board! We will be twinned with a community via a church.
When I needed a neighbour, were you there, were you there?
When I needed a neighbour, were you there?
And the creed and the colour and the name won’t matter,
Were you there?
Details to follow soon.
Your Mission and Outreach Committee
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