Stories of Growing Good

Kath is a lay leader and volunteer at St Paul’s Church in Staybridge. The Growing Good ‘Presence’ session helped them identify that they wanted to strengthen the church's relationship with some of the local schools, and particularly the local high school, which sits right behind the church. At the same time the church, supported by Transforming Lives Together, was starting a weekly Place of Welcome - a warm, safe space were everyone is welcome.

It turned out that the school were looking for a social action project that their pupils could get involved with and saw a post about the Place of Welcome on Facebook. There were all kinds of health and safety challenges to consider, but now the church delivers vegetables to the school on Wednesday afternoon and on Thursday morning the food technology students make soup which is served for lunch to guests at the Place of Welcome.

“Doing Growing Good has encouraged people in the group to be more open to volunteering. It’s also helped us focus on hospitality and participation. Some visitors to the Place of Welcome have now become volunteers, as this is their place. He need for people to feel valued is just as important as offering them hot soup.”

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