Good Friday Morning!
Earlier this year Diane Fullerton began to pull together folk to form Circles of Care. A Circle of Care is a group of three or more people who would respond to a need for care in our community. For instance, upon an individual returning from the hospital, a Circle of Care would plan and deliver three or four meals to the individual’s home. The same could occur for a family after the death of a loved one or at some other crisis point. A Circle of Care could also be formed around a senior who would benefit from regular visits. Thank you Diane for this idea! It’s been amazing to watch the community come together!
Yesterday I was made aware of a web application (also available as an app for your phone – – lotsa helping hands on the app store) that could assist us in this ministry: http://www.lotsahelpinghands.com. It is brilliant in its simplicity.
Each community creates a profile page. Ours is SUC Circle of Care and invites those who want to participate in the caring to join. The coordinator creates tasks that need to be completed, needs of the community, ministry opportunities, including any specifics such as dietary needs, address, phone number etc. Then the magic happens: members of the community, those who have signed up to be part of the SUC Circle of Care, visit the page (which looks like a calendar) and view the needs that have been identified and volunteer to respond to that need by clicking on the need. This takes you to a screen on which all of the necessary information is listed.
I am quite intrigued as I believe that this could assist us in being more responsive to ministry opportunities while minimizing the need for meetings. It could be used to indicate opportunities to serve as greeters, host coffee and conversation, organize fund raisers, serve as reader, provide child care, etc.
Below is a link that is an invitation to join SUC Circle of Care. Please consider joining, poking around within and offering feedback on how it might be used within our community.
Faithfully, Lloyd
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