St. James Presbyterian Church Marks 100 Year Milestone!

St. James Presbyterian Church is celebrating 100 years as a congregation.  They chose to mark this milestone with the theme of “Remembering, Rejoicing and Rededicating.”

 The Celebration Committee and the congregation embraced three projects that held to their theme and highlighted their goals as a Christian community:

 1.  They determined to give Winnipeg Harvest 100 items from their top ten most wanted list, choosing a different item each month from September to June.  With God’s help, they have reached and surpassed this goal each month.

 2.  They determined to give Siloam Mission 100 hours of service.  they enlisted a team of ten different volunteers on four different Saturdays to prepare and serve lunch at Siloam Mission.  With God’s help, they have had a full roster on each volunteer day.

 3.  They determined to support Inner City Youth Alive in their mission to provide a healthy breakfast to inner city students who would go to school hungry otherwise.  They can provide 100 breakfasts for $236.00.  The St. James Youth prepared and hosted a baked potato lunch for the congregation after worship hoping to raise enough funds to provide 100 breakfasts.  With God’s help, they raised enough money for 150 breakfasts.

 One of the things they are joyously celebrating is 100 years of hospitality. Over these 100 years they have offered a warm welcome to worship and ready inclusion to groups.  Everyone has benefitted from the happy coincidence that in so many cases, a warm, generous heart went hand-in-hand with a special talent in the kitchen.  From welcome lunches for newcomers, through meals to precede Alpha study, and muffins before Bible Study, to fund-raising Soup and Pie lunches and bake sales, St. James has been blessed with remarkable talent in their kitchens. 

They published a cookbook twenty years ago which is much treasured and much used. But it didn’t have all their favourites.  They worried that certain favourite recipes might get forgotten. They put out a call for their 100 favourite recipes.  Some recipes were submitted multiple times showing they were favourites indeed. 

 Many recipes have been gathered carefully over time.  Individuals carefully saved hand-written notes that are cherished as they were specialties of congregants who have retired from bringing these tasty morsels.  Some of their older members moved on to living without full kitchens.  Other members have died and their generous hearts are remembered by using their recipes and trying to achieve the same satisfying results. 

 Gateway Publishing has helped this congregation preserve cherished recipes and cherished memories from 100 years of gathering together. At the same time, the St. James Presbyterian Church congregation has been able to reach their fundraising goals by the sales of their cookbook. Let Gateway help YOUR congregation or organization do the same.

Church fundraising cookbook will help orphaned children In Haiti

It’s normally a given that the purpose of a cookbook is to help feed the hungry. But in the case of “Connecting To Haiti”, a new fundraising effort by The Dwelling Place (Springvale Brethren In Christ Church), in Hagersville, Ontario, that intention is twofold.

Not only is the 131-recipe digest designed to delight and satisfy the appetites of those who purchase and use the cookbook, but monies raised from the fundraising project’s sales go to help with the care of children in two Haitian orphanages.

The decision to help feed impoverished children living at the Mission of Hope Orphanage and Tytoo Gardens Orphanage came after a series of mission projects in Haiti that saw members of The Dwelling Place observe firsthand the extreme poverty and homelessness faced by many, including young people.

The first run of 350 books is available now, and copies of Connecting To Haiti can be purchased via e-mail for just $10 each. In addition to a variety of delicious and heartwarming recipes, the cookbook includes several pages of color photos depicting the very children who will benefit directly from the proceeds of this fundraising cookbook project.

“Just looking at the images of those beautiful smiling faces in the book, it’s easy to see what makes this fundraising cookbook such a noble and important initiative,” says Rhonda Pineau, Sales and Marketing Manager of Gateway Publishing’s cookbooks department. “We commend the folks from The Dwelling Place for their determination to make a difference in the lives of these children and wish them nothing but success in this endeavor.”

Is your organization looking for an effective way to raise money? Gateway Publishing has helped thousands of organizations achieve their goals with fundraising cookbooks. Click now to estimate the fundraising potential of your cookbook project.