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Outreach

Quick Links to Help Others and Change the World ... 

  ♦ Fight Hunger and Want   ♦ Hands-on Ministry
  ♦ Promote Peace   ♦ Compassionate Gifts of Support  & Prayer

The Community Church of Poway is passionate about ministry to other people regardless of their race, creed, culture, faith, etc.  Our Board of Christian Outreach plans year-round to promote activities that reach out in compassion and assistance to our neighbors near and far.  This page describes a number of those activities that we sponsor regularly.

For more information about our Outreach Program, or to participate in any of our activities, please see our events calendar, the Sunday worship bulletin, or Contact Us.
 

Join the Fight Against Hunger and Want
Erasing Hunger
 We are active in the fight to reduce hunger. On a regular basis we donate to the food bank at Interfaith Community Services (ICS) in Escondido and Oceanside (www.interfaithservices.org).
We also maintain a local emergency food cache at our church. Annually with other area faith communities we coordinate the Poway/Rancho Bernardo CROP Hunger Walk to raise funds to end hunger at home and around the world. CROP refers to “Communities Responding to Overcome Poverty.”  CROP Hunger Walks are interfaith hunger education and fundraising events sponsored by Church World Service in many localities with the assistance of local faith communities.
“Basket Sunday” Gifts
Each month we choose a project or organization that aids the needy and we ask them to provide a list of the items that they need most urgently.  We publish the list in our church bulletin and collect the items in the shopping cart found in the Narthex (entry way) of the church.  Some of the groups we have helped recently are:
Gifts to Visitors in Need
Our church distributes emergency food for one or two days. We also direct those in need to agencies, such as Interfaith Community Services, that can provide further assistance.

 
Promote Peace and Tolerant Coexistance
Interfaith Activities
We are a leader in the Interfaith movement to promote peace through understanding more about the different faiths found in the world.  We are a member of the POway INterfaith Team (POINT, www.powayinterfaithteam.org) and have served as host for their Interfaith Summer Nights series since 2007.  Each year a question or set of questions is posed to all of the participating faith groups and the evening program typically consists of two faiths presenting information about their faith and their faith's take on the questions posed.  The evening concludes with food representative of the culture of that week's featured faith groups.  The Interfaith Summer Nights programs typically are scheduled weekly during the months of July and August.  [ Contact Us ] or checkout the [ POway INterfaith Team website ] for more information.

 
Hands-on Ministry / Mission Trips

"Do Church"
Several times a year we use the time between the two Sunday morning services to work on a project to help those in need. One Sunday we made 200 sack lunches for the homeless that were distributed by Interfaith Community Services. Another project was to make dresses for orphan girls overseas. Also, we've packed boxes of supplies for military serving in Afghanistan that included sunscreen, nutritious snacks, disposable razors, etc.
Guatemala Project
Some of our members and friends sign up with the Guatemala Project and travel to Guatemala each year to install high efficiency stoves in the homes of Mayans living in remote villages in the highlands of Guatemala. Locally, we raise money to support the Guatemala Project by selling handcrafted items made by women of Guatemala, or by accepting monetary donations for educational scholarship for Guatemalans provided by the Guatemala Project.

 
Gifts of Compassion, Prayer, and Support
Military Care Packages
We welcome requests from a friend or member of the church for a care package to be sent to someone in the military who is serving far from home. Our package includes notes/letters with our prayers along with socks, Chap-Stick, candy, beef jerky, sunflower seeds, coffee, Handi Wipes, prayer squares, and pocket crosses.

Prayers & Squares
We have an active prayer quilt ministry where quilts are created by a group that meets twice a month. Each quilt is sewn in response to a person in need who requests the quilt and asks for prayers. Each quilt has loose strings when it is brought to a Sunday worship service. After the service, members tie a knot in those strings while praying for the person who will receive the quilt. There is never a charge for a prayer quilt and the recipient specifies what he/she requests in the prayer. See our CALENDAR for Saturday's Prayers and Squares meeting times and for more information about this ministry, CLICK HERE to view the national Prayers and Squares website.

Sewing classes for those who would like to learn to make prayer quilts are available the second and third Thursdays of each month 5:00 PM - 8:00 PM in Fellowship Hall.