A Home for the Aged, a Soup Kitchen and a Basic School: A Cross Roads Church Holds a Concert to Keep Them Running

• St Luke’s Anglican Church in Cross Roads staged a gospel concert to raise money for its outreach
• It runs a soup kitchen and the St Luke’s Home for the Aged
• It also funds St Simon’s Basic School in Jones Town and two tertiary scholarships
• The rector said demand had grown with the rising cost of living

St Luke’s Anglican Church in Cross Roads, St Andrew, is again raising money to fund its outreach, the Jamaica Observer reported, with a concert called ‘Reggae Jazz & Blues Go Gospel’ at its 89 Slipe Road location.

Featured artistes included Ernie Smith, Sparrow Martin & Friends, Yahnii Righteous, Mary Isaacs, DiMario McDowell, Charmaine Lemonius, Maurice Henry, Celia Christie-Samuels and Rev Leslie Mowatt. Admission was $1,500.

Church officials said demand for help had grown with the worsening economic situation, rising cost of living and limited job opportunities. The church runs a weekly soup kitchen and the St Luke’s Home for the Aged, pays for two tertiary scholarships and funds St Simon’s Basic School in nearby Jones Town. It also helps people from surrounding communities who come asking for school fees, books, work tools, food and bus fares.

“Under these circumstances, our mandate has to extend beyond just meeting the spiritual needs of our membership, to responding in a meaningful way to human suffering and need in the wider community,” said the rector, Archdeacon Patrick Cunningham.

St Luke’s supports a full set of buildings from its own fundraising: a home for the aged, a basic school and a kitchen, as well as the church itself. Each needs regular money for staff, utilities and repairs, and that need grows in hard times, just as it gets harder to raise. Concerts and events help, but a home for the aged and a school are long-term commitments that need steady funding. Churches running such institutions should put the buildings on a sound footing with maintenance budgets, reserves and, where possible, regular sponsors, so the work does not depend on one good concert.

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