As always, many thanks to all of you who faithfully tithe so that we can budget for local benevolence needs, and thanks to those who also give over and above!
We are starting to see a rebound in call volume since we ran out of funding in mid-January. It was very quiet for a few weeks, and that was okay, because it had been getting hard to get all my other work done with the number of calls that were coming in. In just that first half of January, during the cold snap, we provided 11 motel rooms! We also helped with 8 water bills, 4 rent payments, and one electric bill. In February, we helped one family with rent, 6 water bills, and 5 electric bills. We’re also giving out about three dozen brown bag meals every month. When we ran out of the batch made by Women’s Ministry on January 20, the Scouts came and made three dozen more.
On Monday, March 4, we hosted a Collaborator Appreciation Luncheon for the agencies we work with, and we invited other churches with benevolence ministries to join us to make connections. Besides Catholic Charities and Lutheran Family and Children’s Services, we had five other churches/ministries, and representatives of ten social services agencies, plus the City of Kirksville, for a total of about 45 people. Parishioners provided all the food, and we used the nice dishes at Newman. I think we were able to provide an experience that conveyed our gratitude while offering the opportunity to network with other helpers in the community. We also created a directory of attendees, so that nobody had to juggle business cards or scraps of paper when meeting someone new.
It is always a privilege to work with you as we labor to bring about the Kingdom of God in Adair County!