Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts with the label Trussell Trust

Green shoots

My post of yesterday seems to have struck a chord or two given the amount of traffic it has generated on the site... That's encouraging, as I was very reluctant to post it, because, contrary to popular perception I'm not grumpy about everything all the time. I'm forever telling my congregation that we are good news people not bad news, so in contrast to my 12 mid-winter gripes of yesterday, here are 12 signs of hope that keep me going. They are not direct responses to the issues I raised, but are examples of the things that remind me that, in the midst of a fallen world, God in his grace is at work redeeming and renewing that which he once looked on and called good... So here goes: The commitment of Christian people across the UK to help the poorest in society through food pantries and other initiatives, including the Trussell Trust Foodbanks which have grown into a 300 strong network over the past 13 years, with 100 being established in the last year... with, hopefu...
Post a Comment
Read more

Banks of Grace

This morning I'm off to a meeting with mixed feelings... It breaks my heart that I have to go to it at all, but it is  also a wee ray of hope against a fairly bleak background. The background is created by an economic environment where people are facing mounting debts and are facing the choice of feeding or clothing their families, or heating their homes, and where small charities that have been seeking to help such people, such as our own Dundonald Family and Community Initiative, are having to fold due to lack of sustainable funding. So much for the BIG society... The ray of hope comes in the form of community food pantries... I first came across such ventures in the US on various fact-finding tours including one 5 years ago with a group of church leaders and civil servants under the auspices of CCWA, where we visited programmes in Pittsburgh and Washington DC. Many of us were impressed with what we saw but roundly dismissed the need for such ventures in the UK with our much va...
Post a Comment
Read more