Photos by Jocelyn Sideco (St. Paul’s Burlingame), Kathy Kennedy

On Saturday September 20th Outreach leaders of the Episcopal churches in San Mateo County and northern Santa Clara counties gathered at Christ Church Portola Valley Woodside to learn about one another’s charitable programs, discuss common challenges and to look for areas where we can collaborate.  Our initial purpose of “Outreach Exchange” was simply to meet one another then, after a brief discussion of threats faced by the charities we nurture, to focus on understanding one another’s programs many of which overlap.

Kathy Kennedy, Outreach Chair for Christ Church Portola Valley Woodside, set the tone by telling how her group reached out to a few diocesan Episcopal churches in February as they worked to raise scholarships for 94 student nurses in Malawi, Africa who were sponsored by GAIA Global Health.  When USAID collapsed so did their scholarships.  Timely assistance arrived “but we realized we had no easy way to reach our counterparts to help with fund-raising,” said Kennedy.  “Many other charitable organizations face serious financial issues in these challenging times.  We need to be able to work together.”

By reaching out to our neighbor parishes and with help from Diocesan clergy, we identified sixteen churches in our geographic area.  Carol Wentworth, who co-chaired the Outreach gathering, said “the hard part was identifying the Outreach leaders at each church, getting their contact information and learning what programs they run.”  Nine churches were able to attend this first meeting.  “It was all worth it once we got together,” says Kennedy.  Contact information was shared with all attendees.

After some coffee and banana bread we started with a prayerful poem by Choctaw Episcopal Bishop Steven Charleston read by Mary Jennings of Christ Church Los Altos.  “Virtually none of us had ever met before,” says Wentworth “so our first priority was to get to know one another even before we learned about one another’s programs.”  Christ Church parishioner Carl Cheney professionally designs strategic training programs and helped craft the program so that people moved around, met one another and had a chance to introduce their programs.   The patio was designed with both an auditorium section and with tables for breakout sessions.

Says Kennedy “during the program I was able to learn the specifics from Outreach chair Ken Myers on how tiny Holy Family Episcopal Church in Half Moon Bay provides nearly 500 backpacks filled with school supplies to very low income coast side kids each year.  Mary Chaw from Holy Child and St. Martin Episcopal Church in Daly City left us all speechless as she described providing 350,000 meals to the needy (so far this year) by picking up unused food from local restaurants,” says Kennedy.  “Everyone had fund-raising stories,” recalls Wentworth.  “One of the most successful was described by Monika Hakota of St. Paul’s in Burlingame which runs a twice-a-year rummage sale that raises $30,000 each time.”

“Carl told us that the program would be successful if people wanted to meet again and collaborations started during the program.  That is just what happened,” reports Wentworth.  Doctor Tom Watters from The Episcopal Church of Saint Matthew in San Mateo described their monthly Laundry Love program for low income or homeless people at a local laundromat, a program that St Edmund’s Church in Pacifica hopes to emulate.  “Currently we are collecting Halloween costumes for kids/teens at Life Moves Haven House shelter, a program being led by Trinity Church in Menlo Park, and we look forward to work with Epiphany Church in San Carlos on a November program for 40 homeless veterans staying at a Life Moves shelter,” reports Kennedy.

Sixteen churches were invited along with ten charities and two “tool” makers whose products can help with volunteer recruitment or fund-raising.  The charities/tool makers each had a booth in a breezeway and during a half-hour program break everyone mingled.

Informational flyers and contact information was available for the churches.  Life Moves provides 26 interim shelters in the two counties and Tassie Jenkins of Episcopal Church of Epiphany was excited to meet Life Moves volunteer coordinator Lynelle Bilsey.  Angela Hey is the Board Chair of SpiritCare which visits with forgotten seniors at 80+ care homes in the Bay Area and only one of the churches knew about them before so, for her, it was a great opportunity.  Mary Beth Train of St Mark’s in Palo Alto was happy to talk about Crop Walk which she will lead on Sunday October 26th.  That program raises money for the Ecumenical Hunger Program in East Palo Alto along with combatting hunger abroad.   Other participants included Correctional Institutions Chaplaincy of Santa Clara, Project WeHope which runs shelters in East Palo Alto, Half Moon Bay and San Francisco and runs a mobile laundry/shower program in the greater Bay Area and the Episcopal Impact Fund which is a philanthropy focused on dignified housing and breaking the cycle of poverty.  It was a popular stop for many.  Faith in Action advocates for affordable housing and monitors ICE activity.  Internationally, GAIA talked about their work eliminating AIDS and malaria in Malawi, Africa and Rise Against Hunger talked about their program to eradicate hunger worldwide.  “Our church made 15,000 meals with RAH two weeks before and it is a great way to get a hundred community people working together for a good cause,” says Kennedy.  “It has also been a powerful tool for church building.”

Two tool makers participated.  SignUp Genius is used to recruit volunteers and more recently added capabilities to raise funds.  Two teens, Katie and Josie Miller, from Christ Church Portola Valley Woodside have developed an app to link teens who want to volunteer in the community with Outreach charitable programs.  Both the churches and the charities wanted to know more about that.

During a wonderful lunch prepared by vibrant 92 year old Ruth Ann Wrucke and her team, church Outreach groups and the charities continued their conversations.  Afterwards the churches went to their last breakout session to discuss “Given what we have learned today, where could this group go in the future to make a real impact?”  Learning from and inspiring each other was valuable and we were encouraged to keep the communications and collaboration going.

Generally we all agreed the Episcopal Outreach programs need to work together.  Other churches volunteered to host future programs.  We want to share a common events calendar and Angela Hey and Kathy Kennedy are working on setting that up.  “I am working on final fixes to the church contact list which will include include contact information for participating charities and tool makers.  I hope to send it electronically to all the church Outreaches this week, including the ones who couldn’t make the initial meeting,” reports Kennedy.

Photos with captions:

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  Ruth Ann Wrucke serves a scrumptious lunch to hungry Episcopal Church Outreach leads including Ken Myers of Holy Family Episcopal Church

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  Tassie Jenkins, co-chair of Outreach at Episcopal Church of the Epiphany in San Carlos describes their program

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  Jeremy Loader of Rise Against Hunger shows how you box up meals to send to the starving abroad. Each filled box provides enough food to keep a child alive for a year.

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  Small group Outreach Breakout Session on the Patio

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  Some of the many Outreach Exchange program participants (photo by Jocelyn Sideco)

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  Twins Katie and Josie Miller explain their SpirtPact App which is designed to link teens with volunteer opportunities through church Outreach programs.