You can never outgive God

Each year, St Mary’s Church gives a minimum of 10% of all monies received to charity. We believe in being a generous church to those around us. We support a wide range of charities and causes, local, national and international.  We do this through special events and activities as well as direct donations from our members and church funds. 

ST MARY'S SUMMER FUNDRAISING CAMPAIGN 2021

Every summer at St Mary’s we try as hard as we can to raise £1500 (and often significantly more) to be shared between a local charity of our choice and the church.  The church’s share is used to fund improvements that benefit the community. With COVID having had an enormous impact on attendance in church for worship and funerals we’re intending to use the money to improve the technology we need to stream these services online. We are delighted that the remaining 50% of the proceeds from our Summer Fundraising Campaign will be donated to Peterborough Samaritans (https://www.samaritans.org/branches/peterborough/).

Nationally, Samaritans are a dedicated team of more than 20,000 volunteers, available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year for those who are struggling to cope and who need someone to listen without judgement or pressure. Samaritans work tirelessly to make sure there’s someone there for anyone who needs someone. Their vision is to make suicide prevention a priority and so, in addition to the services they provide, an important part of their work is understanding and challenging the social elements that impact suicide.

According to their website, deaths by suicide rose 10.9% in the UK in 2018 and, though data for 2019 & 2020 is not yet available, Samaritans is seeing the direct impact of the coronavirus pandemic on people’s social, psychological and economic wellbeing. In the year since 23^rd March 2020 (when restrictions began in the UK) Coronavirus was raised as a specific concern in 22% of emotional support contacts. Emails to Samaritans also increased (by 23% compared to the previous year) and 12% more calls were received at night. 

In the run-up to Christmas Volunteers on the 24-hour helpline said the majority of callers worried about their wellbeing were concerned about being separated from family and loved ones, about coping with being lonely during Christmas or about having to spend Christmas alone.

Clearly Peterborough Samaritans needs our help. Please think about how you can support us to reach our £1500 target and make a big difference to someone’s life. You might invite friends, family or colleagues around for some socially-distanced tea and cake in exchange for donations; offer them your services or tuition, whether it be gardening, cleaning, ironing, technology or language skills; sell something you’ve made or simply no longer need and donate the proceeds; or be sponsored to do (or not do) something. Further ideas are available on Samaritans’ website (https://www.samaritans.org/support-us/events-and-fundraising/). Best of all please do support those who are raising money for the Fundraiser.

Abbi Smith is once again coordinating our fundraising activity and would love to hear your ideas. The fundraiser will kick off in July and we will hand-over a cheque at our Harvest Festival in October, so there’s plenty of time to get involved. For more information please contact Abbi via the St Mary’s Church Office (office@peterborough-stmarys.org.uk) or ring (01733) 564899). Please remember to log the date of your event with Abbi so that no clashes take place.

Summer Fundraising Campaign 2021 Update

Our Summer Fundraiser is now well underway with the aim of raising as much money as we can in support of Peterborough Samaritans (https://www.samaritans.org/branches/peterborough/). 50% of donations will be used by St Mary’s to improve the technology we need to stream St Mary’s services online. 

So far, our bellringers have rung a quarter peal; Angela is selling delicious homemade jam and Joyce is selling her tempting cakes and desserts. Andrew & Joseph are hoping to bake their scrumptious bread too (watch this space for details) and Paul Thomas is very generously auctioning his home cinema speaker system. Meanwhile some of our other friends are being very active if you would like to support them:

Helen & Andrew Brown have been rowing the equivalent of 40 miles on their rowing machine to mark their 40th wedding anniversary.

You can donate at www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/helen-and-andrews-ruby-row 

Elizabeth & Stuart Pedley have completed their walk the length of St Oswald’s Way (97 miles) but did it locally so hope you were able to give them a cheer if you saw them on the road: 

https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/elizabeth-stuart-pedley?utm_term=jQ6zDMJzW 

David Pipe completed a 300 miles cycle challenge to raise valuable funds, you can donat at https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/janette-jones-pipe 

Sue & Michael walked 20 miles in one day on the 27th August – to donate: https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/sueandmichaelmoore