Our national charity: Home for Good.

The Mission and Outreach Team (MOT for short) have reorganised themselves to ensure that you, our church family, are involved in our relationship with the charities which you chose. We will be writing a regular blog giving you updates about the charities and how you can get involved. This is our first one, and it’s about our national charity, Home for Good.

Already St Andrew’s has had a fund raising concert and the PCC has given them their first grant. But it’s not just about giving them financial support……

Every 15 minutes, a child comes into care in the UK. This staggering statistic highlights the scale of the charity’s mission to ensure that every child who needs one has a loving home through fostering, adoption and supported lodgings for teenagers. St Andrew’s PCC signed up to being a Home for Good church at their meeting in March 2025 and we now have an important role to partner with the charity to realise their vision.

We are going to do this in several ways:

• We are asking you to pray for

  • children and young people with lived experience of care, and for foster carers and adoptive parents, as well as supported lodgings hosts

  • birth families

• We are asking you to be there! Our first visit from our local Home for Good representative is on Sunday 18th May. Please come ready to welcome Imogen to our church at the 8am and 10am services and hear more about the work of the charity.

• We are asking you to turn up! St Andrew’s will host an event, probably at the beginning of July, for other churches, local agencies, and local community groups, to hear about the current situation locally regarding fostering and adoption. We hope many of you will come and show your support for this initiative.

• We are asking you to find out more about the challenges for young people of being in care. We are recommending the book ‘Looked After – A Childhood in Care’ by Ashley John-Baptiste. It’s a very moving account of Ashley’s life in care from the age of 4 (his earliest memory of being ‘looked after’). He now works for the BBC as an award winning presenter and journalist, which in itself is a remarkable testament to his perseverance against unbelievable odds. Caroline has a copy of the book if you would like to borrow it or it can be reserved at your local library.

  
  

Your Home for Good leaders are Valerie Littleford, Caroline Riches and Jenny Tomlinson – please come and chat with us about how you can get involved.