Category Archives: Mission and Outreach

Three outreach drop-ins will be held during summer 2018

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Three outreach drop-ins will be held during summer 2018

Are you looking for an opportunity to put BELLS into action?

Monday Morning Dropin

Monday Morning Dropin guests and crew

The cathedral's Outreach Committee is offering three possibilities this summer. Its Monday morning drop-ins for people in need usually run from mid-September until mid-May, and then the volunteers take a well-earned summer break. This summer, though, drop-ins will be held at the hall on three Mondays from 8:30 to 10 a.m.: June 18, July 16, August 13.

“The book we're reading throughout the diocese is urging us to develop missional habits nicknamed BELLS: blessing, eating, learning, listening and sending,” said Ann Deveau, an organizer of the Monday drop-ins. “We're hoping some folks will want to step up and help us with these three extra drop-ins as a way to bless those less fortunate and to build community.”

Ways to help include setting up or cleaning up, baking muffins, providing fruit, bringing doughnuts, chatting and eating with guests, playing live music, doing dishes.

We're hoping some folks will want to step up and help us with these three extra drop-ins

The parish nurse plans to do blood pressure and blood glucose readings for guests on these dates and on several other Mondays this summer. A couple of volunteers might offer to take the guests across the street for a tour of the cathedral with one of the cathedral's summer tour guides.

The guests are delighted the drop-ins will take place monthly during the summer. As volunteer Sandy Robb put it: “People are poor in the summer, too, and appreciate the gift cards or bus tickets. Normally, all the churches downtown stop their outreach programs due to summer holidays. This year it's nice that people can still come and keep in touch with their friends.”

Please contact outreach chair Penny Ericson or committee member Ann Deveau if you can help with plans for June 18th, July 16th or August 13th.

“If anyone can prepare food or attend any of the three sessions, it would be a wonderful way to put your faith into action,” Ann said. “It could also give the usual volunteers a rest which would be its own blessing. We also appreciate your prayers for the success of this summer project.”

Cathedral Outreach

Sandy Robb – A Fredericton Unsung Hero

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The City of Fredericton Unsung Hero Awards are meant to acknowledge those individuals who go above and beyond to help build and shape their community. This includes helping bolster the work of social groups and organizations that offer recreational, cultural, or charitable services to the community.

Sandy Robb Unsung Hero

Penny Ericson, Fredericton South MLA David Coon and Sandy Robb

Sandy Robb, one of our volunteers with the Monday Morning Drop in, recently became an Unsung Hero recipient.

The photo is of Sandy, a formerly homeless woman. The award, given to eight people this year, acknowledges individuals who go above and beyond to shape a more compassionate and welcoming community. Among those who congratulated Sandy following the ceremony were Penny Ericson, chair of the Cathedral's Outreach Committee, and Fredericton South MLA David Coon.

The City web site says: "The Intercultural Award is given to an individual, group, or organization whose actions have contributed to promoting cultural diversity and have helped newcomers integrate into the community at large here in Fredericton."

Moment for Missions – April 2018

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“The Missions Committee would like to thank Beverly Morell for her leadership in the Belize Ministry. Over the past 10 years she has willingly devoted herself to the many tasks involved in this role, and we are very grateful for her leadership.

The four members of the 2018 mission team who will be assuming Beverly’s duties are Rebecca Butler, Caryn Gunter, Kelley Hall and Carol Ann Melvin. We wish them success in their new roles.”

Moment for Missions: March 2018

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Moment for Missions

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I; send me!” ~ Isaiah 6:8 (NRSV)

The living God of the Bible is a sending God, which is what ‘mission’ means. He sent the prophets to Israel. He sent his son into the world… He also sent the Spirit to the church and sends him into our hearts today. ~ John Stott, Authentic Christianity, (1995), p. 315

~Gregg Finley, on behalf of the Missions Committee

What’s a Walking Taco? – 22 March 2018 at 6:00 p.m.

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Twenty-one people from the diocese are going to Toronto in late April. They will spend the week with the poor and needy, do chores and help wherever they can, spreading the gospel and doing good works. But don’t call it a mission trip.

We’re rebranding

“We’re rebranding,” said Colin McDonald, director of youth and intergenerational ministries in the Diocese of Fredericton. “It’s not a mission trip. We’re going on a student pilgrimage. What we’re really doing is forming people — our own people. We’re expecting to get far more from the people we encounter than we’ll give.”

A fund-raiser will be held at the Cathedral Hall. Visit the Facebook event page if you're "interested" or "going." Cost is $10 person or $30 for a family. Donations also welcome.

he group of nine leaders and 13 young people have been meeting, praying and studying the bible in preparation for the trip. The most recent meeting was held at Outflow Ministry, the same men’s shelter that now houses the Parish of Millidgeville after it left its north-end building last fall.

Read about the up-coming trip here.

Ending Homelessness: How can the Fredericton Anglican community help?

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Penny Ericson on 11 March 2018 – Homelessness Initiative


The community of Fredericton is working to drastically change the way we collectively respond to homelessness through the implementation of a multiyear Plan to End Homelessness developed through collective planning by non-profits, different orders of government and community members.

The $10 million Plan, The Road Home, will work to house and support 267 chronic and episodically homeless and stabilize 1,033 households at risk of or experiencing transitional homeless. Moving from merely managing homelessness through emergency service to adopting a community wide strategy will create $3.2 million in savings in the first four years.

The Road Home is grounded in Housing First: an evidence-based model that focuses on quickly moving people experiencing homelessness into independent and permanent housing and then providing additional supports and services as needed.  This model rejects 'housing readiness' approaches that have far too often left our most vulnerable trapped in a long-term or inescapable cycle of homelessness.

Information Session
Saturday, 24 March 2018, 10:00 a.m.
Cathedral Memorial Hall
with
Mayor Mike O'Brien - City of Fredericton

AUDIO Listen to an interview with Faith McFarland on 04 April 2017 about affordable housing
AUDIO Listen to an interview with Faith McFarland on 10 May 2017 about ending homelessness
VIDEO Portrait of a formerly homeless woman - Sandy Robb
VIDEO Housing First Initiative in Fredericton
Homeless Hub - Making Research Matter - Canada
Download or view the Plan

From the Plan ...
Our Plan sets forth a course of action that will result in significant shifts in our community’s collective approach to a widespread social challenge. We cannot promise that no one will ever experience homelessness again in our community: the root causes involved in housing instability are well beyond our capacity to redress in this Plan. Factors like poverty, the macro-economics of housing markets, public policy decisions, systemic discrimination experienced by groups including Aboriginal people, as well as the challenges of mental health and additions play critical roles in the dynamics of homelessness. These are structural and systemic factors that we must continue to address, though we cannot resolve them in the short-term. However, there is much we can do.

This Plan is a call to action, first and foremost. It sets out a roadmap that will lead to significant improvements for those experiencing homelessness in our community. It calls for the creation of new interventions, using the proven and cost-effective Housing First approach, to rapidly house and support those in need.

The Plan proposes the enhanced coordination of our homeless-serving system, and its intentional integration with other partners, including health, corrections, police, and child protection. It calls for enhanced information sharing, performance management processes and capacity building to support our frontline service providers. The Plan recognizes the key role all partners play in our collective

Thank you from scholarship student Paul Jones

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Dear Ms Bev and church congregation at Christ Church Cathedral,

I am writing this letter to thank all those who have supported me during my four years of high school. I am so grateful to God for bringing you all into my life.  Without Him none of this would have been possible.  I am happy to say I have made you all proud even though my time in high school is almost over – just a couple of months to finish.

I will never forget you and what you have done for me.  I promise to keep you all posted as I continue to study.  Throughout my four years of studies there are people who have inspired me and uplifted me, especially the Lord.  Throughout my four years of school I have been doing well academically.  Now that I am in my fourth and final year of high school, my goal is to graduate and go to university to study forensics or marine biology, but mostly forensics.

My family and I want to thank you and your congregation for all the support.  I have four months until graduation and I will send you pictures of my graduation and a short video clip of me on my graduation day.

Once again, I want to thank you all from the bottom of my heart.  My prayer for you all is that God bless you always.  I love you all so very much.  Thanks again.  I will keep in touch with you.  Love you all!

Thanks,

Paul Jones

2018 Belize Mission blog

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The Belize Mission Team

Rebecca Butler, Caryn Gunter, Nat Fetter, Carol Ann Melvin, Dean Geoffrey Hall, Kelley Hall, Jim Morell, and Beverly Morell

is scheduled to depart Saturday, 27 January 2018 and spend a week serving at St. Hilda’s Anglican School in the village of Georgeville. Teams from the Cathedral have been travelling to Belize since 2005 and a close bond has been built between our church family and the school and church there. You, at the Cathedral, are our “Home Team” and we ask for your help in one or more of the following ways – (1) pray for the Mission Team daily as they prepare, travel and serve God in Belize; (2) make a special offering so we can buy educational supplies and a computer-compatible projector to take with us for the school; (3) read the daily blog on our website and follow what the Away Team is doing daily at the school; (4) support the Team on the Sunday of commissioning (11:45 a.m. worship on 21 January).

Visit the Belize Mission website

 

2018 Belize Mission