St. Andrews Community Church, Market Street, Craven Arms, Shropshire, SY7 9NW Registered Charity Number: 1147123
Trustee Annual Report: 1[st] May 2022 – 30[th] April 2023
Aims
St. Andrews Community Church (SACC) seeks to enable ordinary people to demonstrate Christian love and care in and around Craven Arms, Shropshire. It carries this out through community, pastoral care, outreach and social activities.
We promote cooperation with other like-minded charities that share Christian values both locally in this rural area and further afield.
Objectives and Aims
We seek to serve the community in areas of need, aim to enrich lives and provide love, care and compassion. By welcoming people to meet together and worship our Lord and creator in different ways, we aim to grow personal relationships with Jesus, to share our passion with others and to seek guidance, strength and compassion that comes from His Holy Spirit. This includes prayer worship, outreach, mission and pastoral care.
SACC enjoys ties to Rural Ministries, works with local denominations in Craven Arms and surrounding towns and villages and supports other charities with similar aims.
Overview.
St Andrews is continuing to function well as a Church and be part of the community. Activities
A) Church Services and Events – all open to the public
We have shared two of our services this year with our sister churches in Craven Arms, hosting Palm Sunday and Harvest Festival followed by a Bring and Share meal in our church. Our Christmas Church service and Carol Service was attended by many outside our fellowship and they enjoyed the hospitality after the Carol Service.
We held a charity choir event at Christmas taking donations for the Craven Arms Good Neighbours Scheme, which was well attended.
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Throughout the summer many tourists staying locally attended St Andrews and enjoyed our hospitality after the service.
B) Prayer and house groups
Prayer groups are held fortnightly in the church. The public are welcome to come in. We have 2 house groups, held in different homes, on different evenings.
Our Christmas Church service and Carol Service was attended by many outside our fellowship and they enjoyed the hospitality after the Carol Service.
C) Community Club
A textile Craft group is held in the Church each week between September and April. We have a group of ladies from the area who join us, two of whom were referred by the Craven Arms Medical practice as It is considered to be therapy.
D) Links with our local schools.
Stokesay School were invited to St Andrews for their Easter and Carol Service. KS1 had a service involving action songs and drama, and KS2‘s Carol Service was interactive. Children were told the Easter story. For the Carol service, some of the children dressed up and acted the nativity, following the Narrator – the local Anglican minister who joined us.
We have volunteers involved with ‘Open the Book’- an interactive way of exploring the Bible. They visit school assemblies in our local area, in Stokesay and Clunbury Primary School.
At Harvest time this year we invited the school council KS1 and KS2 pupils to come and enact working in the food bank and it was filmed. The film was shown to the school at their Harvest festival assembly after a short talk from a Church Leader. The school collected produce for our food bank, which was gratefully received.
E) Links with other charities.
St Andrews held a charity concert at the Church for the Good Neighbours Scheme, which was attended well by the fellowship and others from the town. £350.00 was donated to them. We also have a volunteer that helps in the local ‘Hospice Shop’, where they help raise money for the Shrewsbury Hospice (serving Craven Arms) and meet and talk with people.
2 of our members volunteer for the ‘Craven Arms Good Neighbours Scheme’ This involves picking up and driving elderly, disabled people and others with no transport, to appointments, some as far away as Gebowen Hospital in North Shropshire and Wolverhampton Hospital.
SACC aims to regularly support Missions giving to charity from the annual budget. We have given to the following charities this year; Tear Fund, British and Foreign Bible Society, World Vision, Dalit Freedom Network, Christian Concern, and Christians Against Poverty, as well as our ‘project charity’ -Wheels for the World.
We have donated to an appeal for Ukraine, to an appeal for Syria and Turkey, Good Neighbours Scheme, (Craven Arms branch) Mind and Release International.
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Food Bank
The food bank continues to serve the community. We have been in our premises across from the church for 21 months. It runs on a voucher scheme, giving the recipients 6 times to come in before contacting the agency that referred them. Nearly every time the food bank is open a housing officer becomes part of the team. She makes appointments for people who need help claiming benefits, referring clients on to other agencies and giving them cooking and money management advice. On many occasions we also have a member of staff from the local medical centre occupying a table and offering to take the client’s blood pressure.
Our Food Bank volunteers number over 12 now, from church and the community. 2 of our volunteers are Ukrainian, one of whom understands English, Polish and Russian, so can speak to some that we find hard to communicate with.
The food bank is all inclusive – Our notices are in Ukrainian, Russian and Polish, as well as English.
This Christmas we helped 48 adults and 24 children, supplying hampers to those referred by social services, schools etc. and in the 7 weeks from Christmas to the 23[rd] January, over 300 bags of food were given out. It is becoming increasingly busy. 1500 bags have been given out to needy people over the last year.
A freezer has been purchased by the local Medical Trusts and the Ludlow Food Centre donates bread, cakes and pastries, soups etc. A huge variety of foodstuffs catering for people with food allergies is on hand. Tuffins, our local supermarket, has a collection bin and we purchase fresh fruit and vegetables from there each week.
People from the surrounding villages donate fresh produce and eggs. They also donate nonperishable food and give monetary donations as do some members of St Andrews.
SACC Trustees maintain a regular interest in the financial activities, and in particular, reserves, to ensure there is a balance of unrestricted funds to cover at least 3 months unrestricted expenditure. The balance in reserve has been exceeded in all points this year. SACC has no funds in deficit.
During this period, funds were invested with Kingdom Bank who specialise in supporting Church developments.
SACC does not make grants.
The Leaders, on behalf of the membership, have employed an Architect to draw up plans for our kitchen to be renovated, our front entrance to be extended to include toilets and refurbishment of the Nave. Planning has been passed and the architect is making working drawings. Funding has been provided by a legacy. We hope to use the church for more activities, make more storage so the church does not look cluttered, make a more appealing
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space for worship and a more attractive entrance with toilets and room for disabled people’s aids and a permanent ramp into the building.
Volunteers and Support.
SACC does not currently support a pastor through a Stipend. We are currently blessed with a retired minister and external and sometimes internal speakers, who do not wish to be renumerated. SACC relies extensively on the volunteers for the generosity of their time and energy. The Food bank have 12 volunteers, school and children’s activities- 5, running of the church services - 8
Administration
The leaders elected at the 2021 AGM and church meeting remain as
Mr Marc Richard Morris,
Mrs Julia Irene Gell (Temporary Chair and administration Sept 22 - April 23 ) Mr Keith Christopher Arbery. As of 30[th] April 2022, the trustees of the Charity holding the property were; John Stringer James Joseph Gell Raymond John Heighway John Richard Hughes Andrew Norman Wheeler Judy Cornhill
Governance
St Andrews Community Church (SACC) is an association with members, having been accepted onto the Charities Register on May 3[rd] 2012
Trustees are elected by members of the Church following a nomination and selection process by members, as defined by the Church Rules. As there were only 3 nominees, an election process was not necessary and all 3 trustees were approved as above at the AGM in July 2021. SACC is responsible for the maintenance of the church property, St Andrews, in Market Street, Craven Arms.
SACC has written policies covering: Safeguarding Children and vulnerable People and a Church Constitution.
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ST ANDREWS COMMUNITY CHURCH
Market Street, Craven Arms, Shropshire
Financial Statement for period 1 May 2022 to 30 April 2023
| RECEIPTS & PAYMENTS2022/23 | RECEIPTS & PAYMENTS2022/23 | 2021/22 |
|---|---|---|
| Receipts: | ||
| Offertory | 25,147.60 | 27316.35 |
| Donations-General | 500.00 | 500.00 |
| Bequests | 50,711.25 | 10947.00 |
| Food Bank | 9,289.00 | not shown |
| £85,647.85 |
£38,763.35 | |
| Bank Interest (Kingdom Bank) 57.49 | 22.31 | |
| Tax Reclaimed** |
0.00 | 6584.31 |
| Total Receipts |
£85,705.34 |
£45,369.97 |
| Payments: | ||
| Stipend & HMRC | 0.00 | 57.00 |
| Core Activities | 0.00 | 2,500.64 |
| Mission & Outreach | 5,178.65 | 6,234.00 |
| St Andrews costs | 6,829.80 | 10,404.92 |
| F/Bank costs | 8,238.04 | not shown |
| Other*** | 2,215.88 | 8,912.19 |
| Total payments | £22,462.37 |
£28,108.75 |
| Surplus/Deficit | £63,242.97 | £17,261.22 |
**In process of claiming gift aid back
***Includes payments to Dickinson (1949.65) and Planning Application (266.20) AMOUNT IN CURRENT ACCOUNT @ 30 APRIL 2023 £133,709.10 {1/5/22 = £70,523.62} AMOUNT IN SAVINGS ACCOUNT @ 30 APRIL 2023 (Kingdom Bank) £13,733.26 {1/5/22 = £13,675.77}
From 1[st] February 2023 we have been operating a separate bank account for income and expenses relating to the food bank.
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Declaration Mrs Julia re Gell Mr Marc RKhard Morris FTumkn 22-Wl3