Transcript
Hello. So, if you wouldn't mind, can you just tell us, first of all, who you are and, uh, what it is you do, please? Right, so I'm Sue, and, um, I do a lot of volunteering at the local church. I'm a retired nurse, for been retired for about 2 years. Had to think, what do I want to do? Um, I've done other different things outside the church, volunteering at the hospital
I would say do street pastors, which, but I do an awful lot at the church, doing different things like the warm room on a Monday. I help with that. Not every week, but most weeks
I do a toddler group on Thursday. I've helped with, as I said, outside things, so I was helping at Bracebridge Heath with a group, um, but I've sort of stepped aside. I also, we've just started a loss and bereavement group which I'm involved with that
And also I started doing um they had a cry at Christmas for extra people to help at our nightlife cafes. um so I put my name forward to that, helped a couple of times at that. And um said then I would sort of go on the bank, and recently we've started an offshoot at that at the church called the Beacon Cafe, which is specifically for service people, veterans and also um
Emergency services and as I've got a nursing background and the bits and pieces, I thought that would be a good thing to help out as well. I think I've covered most things. I'm also pastoral care coordinator, which just is obviously with the church
So why do you volunteer and what do you get out of it? I volunteer mainly because of my Christian faith. I believe that it's important to help um as Jesus's example, and I think we should be helping in the world in anything and everything. We should be an outlooking church, not an inward looking church, um, so not just helping in the church, but going out of the church and helping in the local community and anything else
Um, I forgot to say I also help at things like festivals, Christian festivals and things, so that's going even more wider. Um, and I just think that's important to my faith, to help people help where they are and hopefully help them in moving forward, not just to become a Christian, but I think it's just important to help people, you know, they might step into church once and never come back. That's fine
But hopefully I've just imparted some love that Jesus would at the time to strangers, and for me, I think it's, it's good for my, Health and wellbeing as well, because you feel like you're helping in the community and in the church, and yes, you do get a few compliments and and to be honest, I hate that and I prefer to just go and hide in the corner and do the washing up and and I'm not out for the compliments, but it's just nice knowing that you can help people and, and then you feel that you, you're being helpful. So is there one particular volunteering experience at the moment that um you would like to share the most about? I think all have their moments, and I think, I don't think I can pinpoint. I've, I, I suppose the longest one I've been doing is street pastors
And, uh, and every night, I, I feel the variety and the people you meet at nighttime. And the people ask some really interesting questions and Sometimes you could be praying in the middle of a busy, um, well, Lincoln's not that big, but a place and everyone milling around and just the atmosphere and the conversations and talking to people where they're at is, is so rewarding. OK, can you tell us what streetath this is please? Street Pastors is an organisation that was um originally started in London by a pastor who went out and saw there was a need to go out in the community again and help people where they needed
The police were really struggling, the emergency services were really struggling, so he set up this, which has gone nationwide in different parts of the country, and we do it in Lincoln, we've been doing it for over 10 years now, a bit longer, where we go out mainly on the Saturday night from about 10 o'clock. Till 2 in the morning and we help whoever needs help. So you might give drinks to the street people, you might help somebody walk home, you might be clearing up vomit, sorting them out, making them a bit tidier, giving very basic first aid, listening to them
The biggest thing is sometimes talking to the door staff and they offload some of the things that are happening with everything and anything and we hopefully support the police, the police are really grateful, and the biggest thing with that is it's just us going out on the streets, we always have prayer pastors, and they're so important, we wouldn't go out without them, cos we. Talk to them during the course of the evening and we might say, oh we can hear this fighting going on, we ask them to pray and then peace happens and lots of them say, oh, it's usually more peaceful when you're out, and we know why fabulous. Can you tell me about one that you're involved with that circles around, we're at Saint Michael's, Waddington, um, which is also a well-being hub
Can you tell me about one of the volunteering activities here that uh you most enjoy doing perhaps? Um, yeah, well, we've been doing warm space now since, I think it's coming up to its 3rd year. It was when the crisis happened with the heating bills and everyone was struggling that we opened up the church and we did it jointly with Freedom Church for a bit and just did 2 hour slots over the day and let people come in to be warm. Um, as that went on, we gradually just, just concentrated on doing it just for the day again still, but opening it up and doing jacket potatoes, um, and then just we were helping all day rather than just two hour slots cos it was just easier to do
And it's, it, it's, yeah, really grown, you know, we had a few at first, um, some people come just for an hour or two, some people come all day. Um, recently we've introduced things like activities and games. We have board games, we did when we were doing our angels a few, a couple of years ago at church, we were all busily making angels every week to, to fill the church with angels
Um, but we've had, I think, uh, Lincoln football come along and do like seating exercises, which some people like so, you know, you always get people will join in and some won't. We have a group that will just sit there and just chat for the morning, have their little cup of coffee and then go off, um, and that. But, um, I do enjoy it
You get the different people, you get the regulars, and then occasionally you'll get a new person come along. And what do you think the benefit for the community is? Well, definitely hoping that they know that they can come here and find a safe space, maybe warm, maybe food, maybe just quiet space somewhere for a bit of solitude as well. I've walked in here sometimes just and you find people just sat here and that's what hopefully a church would be and that's so, you know, um, I hope the community thinks they can use this
If others were thinking of starting up something or weren't sure about starting up something to serve their wider communities, what would you say to them? I'd say ask around or come to us if they want some support or ask. There's obviously also the volunteer bureau in town and things like this, but you know, I think um come, see if they want some support or if we think it's a good idea, we can help with them, or yeah, have a go. Because I think not always I've started things and you've got one person
But as the weeks go by, more and more, and the thing is, if you don't try it, you don't see, you can talk about something and never try it. But I think, give it a go and see if it works. Fabulous
And one final question, uh, Waddington is classed as a rural area, which is where we are. Do you think that makes a difference to, uh, The hub and the community and the volunteering experience, and can you see any issues with people accessing what goes on at the hub because of being rural? Yeah, I think, I think transport's always the thing. I think, you know, we've had
A few people that have just not been able to get here, cause we haven't got the people to get them and they haven't got the means to get here. And I think that's one of the biggest things that I don't know how to sort out really, um, of getting to a rural place, um, and just getting publicity out because we were talking last week we were down at Low Waddington. And um we were doing a prayer walk and we stopped to talk to a lady at the bus stop and I told her about the wellbeing on a Thursday and she said I knew nothing about it
And we know we've leafleted that area when it first started and, uh, I said the same with toddler group. You can put everything out there and you still get people come and say, I, I didn't know about you. It's try in all areas, you know, social media, uh, leaflets, whatever, and word of mouth
Yep. Thank you, Sue, for sharing your story with us. We really appreciate it
Thank you..
