Charity

Clarendon’s Free Town Foundation, outreach arm of a Church of God of Prophecy congregation, planned a health fair and back-to-school event on its church grounds, aiming for 300 backpacks and 10 scholarships with diaspora support from Toronto and Brooklyn.

To open Food For The Poor’s 40th anniversary, the National Baking Company Foundation and Wisynco donated two houses, one to seamstress Lovette Blair, who had shared a leaky, termite-infested room for 18 years.

Housing Justice published a legal guide by Wrigleys Solicitors telling churches that ‘best value’ for surplus land need not mean the highest price, and can include their charitable mission and community benefit such as affordable housing.

British Caribbean Insurance Company marked its 60th anniversary by funding six houses through Food For The Poor’s Shelter with a Purpose programme, handing the last one to Lera Bless in 2023.

A Christian boys’ home in Old Harbour licensed for 40 residents was housing 55, its manager said, detailing a $600,000 monthly food bill and plans for a second site in Spanish Town as a church youth group brought donations.

Volunteers from the Shortwood Seventh-day Adventist Church spent nearly two years building a one-bedroom house for Lurlene Lawson in Grants Pen, helped by online donations from members at home and in the diaspora.

Bethlehem, a Missionaries of the Poor home for 52 children with special needs, once had a single bathroom. A US$254,000 two-phase renovation funded by the Digicel Foundation brought new facilities and official certification.

The Kiwanis Club of New Kingston gave the Salvation Army School for the Blind a tactile wall, canes and sensory toys worth $230,000, a simple example of accessible design in a faith-run facility.

The Diocese of Chelmsford backed a Housing Justice plan to build about 300 affordable homes on disused church land in England, on top of 86 already delivered in Wales, to tackle homelessness.

An Observer editorial recalled that churches helped found free villages and schools after emancipation and urged them to return to practical activism, a legacy that still shapes church landholding in Jamaica.

A west London Pentecostal church, its community nursery and foodbank were locked out when developer Fruition Properties took possession of 2 Scrubs Lane, despite planning policy requiring space for the church in any redevelopment.

The Eira Schader Home for the Aged in Trench Town was run-down and facing closure in 2016 until the National Leadership Prayer Breakfast made it its beneficiary, giving about $550,000 for repairs that drew in other donors.

A Bermuda craftsman spent two months restoring 14 century-old cedar windows at St Peter’s Church rectory in St George’s in 2021, work paid for by the Friends of St Peter’s Church at a cost of more than $20,000.

Mustard Seed Communities, which houses more than 450 vulnerable children and adults, appealed for donations in 2021 after the pandemic halted a volunteer programme that brought about 1,000 overseas visitors a year.

Food For The Poor Jamaica unveiled a redesigned single-storey house more than 100 square feet larger than its old model, with a curbless shower, septic and water tanks and solar power, and set out what applicants need, including a pastor’s letter.