Serving our Christian Community in St. Louis Park, MN

City of SLP | Children First | STEP | Minneapolis Synod

Lutherans Reaching Out In the Park
Social Action Calendar

May 2012

June 2012

July 2012

Social Action Volunteer Opportunities

Pack the Pews for STEP

Join us and our St. Louis Park neighbors during May in PACKING THE PEWS FOR STEP! During the month of May we will be packing bags of food donations as we make a community-wide effort to fill up STEP's shelves for our neighbors during the summer months when support often goes down and usage goes up. Our friends at Wooddale and Westwood Lutheran churches will be doing the same. Collections will be brought to STEP the afternoon of Sunday, May 20th. We hope we can fill the pews by then.

STEP's Top 10 most needed items:

Community Day of Service

The 2012 Community Day of Service is on May 19-20. Join with area neighbors as we gather together to make a difference in our neighborhoods and around the world. We have projects lined up at Hopkins Schools, City Parks, STEP, ICA, Resource West, Senior Centers, Westwood Nature Center and so many more! Check it out at http://cds2012.eventbrite.com. Commit a few hours or a whole weekend (or a pint of blood!) Be a part of the action.

New Suburban Host Home Program

On any night, an estimated 2,500 Minnesota youth are homeless and on their own. They don't have a safe place to stay. Homeless youth are everywhere, including the suburbs. And the numbers are growing. According to Wilder Research, there are 46% more homeless youth (ages 16 to 21) in Minnesota today than just 3 years ago. A new community initiative - the Suburban Host Home Program - connects homeless teens with caring adults from their own communities who are willing to provide safe housing and support. We are recruiting adult volunteers to open their homes to host homeless youth. And we are seeking support for this important community initiative.

For more information, to make a donation,
or to download an application to be a volunteer host, contact us at:
www.suburbanhosthome.org
Email Address
612-522-1690 ext.113
Avenues for Homeless Youth
1708 Oak Park Avenue North
Minneapolis MN 55411

Our Saviour's Shelter Supper - May 11th

Our next dinner at Our Saviour's Shelter is on Friday, May 11th. The menu is baked chicken, potatoes, salad, vegetable, rolls, dessert, milk and coffee. If you are interested in donating a menu item, talk to Carolee about quantities and logistics. Groceries cost approximately $120.00, so monetary contributions or donations of coffee, boxes of tea and other menu items are always appreciated. Please contact Mark or Carolee to sign up for serving or to donate to the grocery fund.

Our Saviour's Shelter Breakfast - June 9th

Breakfast at Our Saviour's Shelter is on Saturday June 9th. We will serve French toast, sausage, bacon, fruit, juice, and milk. Groceries cost approximately $70.00, so monetary contributions or donations of coffee, boxes of tea and other menu items are always appreciated. Please contact the church to sign up for serving or to donate to the grocery fund.

TreeHouse Meal

Spirit of Christ members have volunteered to serve meals to "at risk" youth who participate in the Tree House program located at the Evangelical Free Church on Minnetonka Boulevard. They currently are looking for meal help over the summer, a time when their teens are most hungry without access to meals at school.

The summer meal schedule is a bit different as they aim to provide a late lunch for the youth. We have 6 meals to fill.
Tuesdays, they just need donations for sandwich fixings. Thursdays, they are off-site and typically volunteers come and grill or provide some other type of summery meal. Please consider the following dates: Tues. July 3, Thurs. July 5, Tues. July 10, Thurs. July 12, Tues. July 24, or Tues. July 31.

Summer Meal Program Description 2012:

Summer is the time when our teens are the MOST HUNGRY because they are not getting food at school. From June 14th-August 30th, we are switching to afternoon programming for our kids: program goes from 2:30-4:30pm, with lunch from 2:30-3:00pm. We still need help feeding kids, but it looks a little differently.

Tuesdays: sandwich bar at our St Louis Park TreeHouse site. We will have someone here to set-up and clean-up, but need donations for the food items listed below. Drop-offs for donations can be set-up at any time.

Suggested Weekly Lunch Supplies for approximately 40 people:Sandwich fixings, fruit, chips, cookies, brownies, and beverages. Condiments and paper goods are provided by our host church. The amounts of food listed above are all rough estimates. Non-produce items can be bought in bulk and stored here at our site for use throughout the summer.

Thursdays: we will be off-site at a park in St. Louis Park, or at Calhoun Beach. We hope to grill every week or have some sort of picnic. We are looking for families, couples, friends, to grill with us and provide the food. If folks are unable to accommodate the afternoon time frame, but want to still get involved, we can take meal donations, and do the grilling ourselves. Again, this would be cooking for roughly 40 people. We are also open to general picnic food (non-grilled).

If you would like to help TreeHouse, please contact Audrey Gustafson, SLP TreeHouse Program Coordinator, 612-801-4741 to schedule a date to prepare a meal for the group or for information about ways to help. Please volunteer to help with this worthy cause.

Families Moving Forward

Families Moving Forward is a faith based nonprofit organization in Minneapolis, Minnesota that provides temporary emergency shelter, permanent affordable housing and supportive services to low income families with children. In collaboration with over 40 local congregations and thousands of volunteers, they provide hope to homeless families with children by:

Providing temporary emergency shelter
Supporting former shelter families with continued advocacy and education
Developing affordable rental housing for families.

Families Moving Forward is free to the families to help families save their resources for the upfront expense of their next home or for the future needs of their family. You can learn more about this program by going to www.familiesmovingforward.org or by signing up to take a 59 minute tour of one of their facilities (look for the schedule under the Get Involved/Opening Doors Tours tab).

Get Involved!

The Social Action team welcomes everyone in the congregation to join us for planning and organizing mission and social action events. This could be an ongoing activity or a one-time commitment.

We would like to express appreciation to the congregation for their support for missions in the community and around the world. Your donations and volunteer efforts will improve many lives this year.

Spirit of Christ supports these programs:

St. Louis Park Emergency Program (STEP)
Dinner At Your Door
Meals on Wheels
Our Saviour's Outreach Ministries
Local School Ministry
Children First
Feed My Starving Children
TreeHouse
Memorial Blood Centers
Missionaries: Chris & Kristin McWeeny
Sojourner Project, Inc.
Wayside House, Inc.
Families Moving Forward
Metro Hope Ministries
N.A. Groups
A.A. Groups

Click here for more information on these ministries.