Present : Eva, Stephen, Sarah, Lindsay
Apologies : Susanne, Tim, Sian
Membership
We are keen to have new members for the group. Lindsay came today and was very much welcomed. If we have any ideas of people who we think might be interested to join.
It would be nice to have some younger input, whilst we recognise the younger members of the parish may not see the committee as appealing. Eva suggested maybe we could touch base with Richard Bushell to see if there is any route to the younger members, maybe some liaison, some idea sharing, some way we could gather what they would want us to be addressing. Stephen agreed to do this.
Food Bank
Stephen has worked on getting a rota together – there are six people who collect on Sundays and then take it over to the centre on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
A push may be needed to get people to donate as donations have dropped off. Sarah will think about some wording that could go in the newsletter, references to the change in the cost of living and the impact on those who will feel it most. One item a week would make such a difference, whether it is a 20p tin of carrots or a £6 bag of nappies, add it to your reminder for your internet shopping or your regular shopping list. If we don’t manage to push it forward this way, then Sarah would be willing to speak after communion to be a different voice to Stephen’s.
CAFOD
At least five parishioners did the 5k a day ‘walk for hunger’ for Lent, which is to be commended.
CAFOD currently don’t have any particularly focused appeal currently which doesn’t help in terms of motivating action within the parish. Stephen wrote to Caritas about the plan to relocate refugees to Rwanda but he has had no response and the Diocesan office feel it isn’t their responsibility as it isn’t about world hunger. It was recognised that it sometimes harder to get action on something which is ‘political’ as in changing existing government policies rather than attempting to get action on something which isn’t being addressed such as climate change. The feeling was we should wait to see if CAFOD have an autumn campaign. Sarah asked if we knew anything about whether anyone is offering housing to Ukrainian refugees but no one is known.
Stephen mentioned Home from Home Hallam, the diocesan group supporting a Syrian family being rehoused in Sheffield, and wondered if the parish should know more about that. Eva is involved in this and felt currently there wasn’t any particular need identified.
At Christmas it was envisaged we would have a world gift, the size depending on whether there is a panto which would fundraise for the same thing.
Lenten reflections
It was agreed that the Lenten reflections were absolutely brilliant and our thanks was given to Tim and Susanne for these. Many people in the parish have said how thought provoking they were.
Future events
Stephen said there are some J & P issues arising out the synod report, about how the church should be more outward looking, caring for others, etc. The lack of precision makes it hard to be aware how we should take that forward. A cake sale in the autumn would be nice!
We need to meet before the big push for money in the autumn for CAFOD. Next meeting suggested at 8pm on 5 October, when Tim & Susanne may be back and hopefully Sian will be free, but to be confirmed