While the churches in Norwich might worship at different hours, with different traditions, they all have one thing in common: they are making a concerted effort to give back this holiday season.

The Norwich Interfaith Council kicked off the season with their annual Thanksgiving Eve Service on Wednesday, November 26th at 5:30 pm. The location of this gathering rotates every year; this Thanksgiving Eve people congregated in The Beaver Meadow Chapel. Appropriately, the theme was, "Who's my neighbor?" Every year the Interfaith Council-coordinated by the one of the Norwich Congregational Church's pastors, Mary Brownlow- chooses an organization worthy to receive the evening's offerings. This year the money went to the Fuel Assistance Program of South Eastern Vermont Community Action (SEVCA).

Both the Norwich Congregational Church (NCC) and St. Barnabas Episcopal Church have also raised money for this organization throughout the year.  SEVCA, which was created in 1965 as part of the nationwide “War on Poverty,” is a private, nonprofit corporation that helps Windham and Windsor county residents “cope with and reduce the hardships of poverty; create sustainable self-sufficiency; and reduce the causes and move toward the elimination of poverty.” This locally governed Community Action Agency offers many programs and services ranging from crisis intervention to housing to nutrition to fuel assistance (and more).

The “Pounds of Pennies” campaign that both NCC and St. Barnabas (and eight other area churches) undertook this fall raised money for SEVCA’s fuel assistantship program. “We’re very concerned about people staying warm this winter,” St. Barnabas Rector Beth Hilgartner explains. NCC’s Sunday School children and the youth groups at St. Barnabas took on the penny campaign as their special projects, making “Pounds of Pennies” labels for coffee cans and other jars. Volunteers scattered these donation jars throughout each church. Within the last several weeks, parish children counted and donated the money to SEVCA. In addition to subsidizing heating fuel (oil, kerosene, propane or wood), SEVCA works with electric companies to prevent disconnection and assists in payment plan negotiations.

Norwich residents responded generously to “Pounds of Pennies.” Mary Brownlow noticed that many NCC parishioners put “more than pennies” into their collection jars. Similarly, Beth Hilgartner says that several members of St. Barnabas gave extra funds. “People know that needs will be great this year,” Hilgartner says. “But more than collect pennies, we hope this will raise people’s awareness.”

Brownlow and Hilgartner have church discretionary funds to help with individual needs such as fuel assistance, but as this need grows due to the increased cost of fuel, both women believe that donating to SEVCA is an important way to extend their relief beyond Norwich. Both parishes will still allocate their discretionary funds to people’s energy needs if an immediate problem arises, however. Hilgartner maintains that it is important for this money to be “available for people’s needs, like paying part of fuel bill if someone in the parish or community needs it.” Mary Brownlow tells how NCC used these funds when a woman asked for help with her energy bill last winter; “We hired someone to do an energy audit and found that simple fix significantly lowered her bill.” NCC’s discretionary fund comes from their Christmas Eve service offering. Brownlow says that people are especially generous when they know that it will go toward emergency relief, such as heating.

Concern about fuel costs is not confined to the Vermont side of the river or to Christian groups, however. The Roth Center’s Upper Valley Jewish Community (UVJC)—whose new President is Norwich resident Rob Gurwitt—chose “Food and Fuel” as their community action theme for the upcoming year. Chair of the Social Action Committee, Carolyn Gordon, works with her team to inform and encourage members to help weatherize homes by volunteering at local, community organizations such as COVER Home Repair. COVER’s Weatherization program helps low income, elderly and disabled families weatherproof their homes. Volunteers help ensure that homes meet the federal Weatherization Assistance Pro­gram’s health and safety guidelines by sealing windows and cracks, insulating hot water pipes and electric outlets and installing door gaskets and sweeps.

The Upper Valley Haven and the Listen Center

The Upper Valley Haven and the Listen Center are other local recipients of both the UVJC and Norwich churches’ donations, although not just during the holidays. Throughout the year, the UVJC, NCC, St. Barnabas and St. Francis collect food for The Haven Food Shelf. “There’s always an increase of giving around holidays,” Beth Hilgartner says. The UVJC holds a “High Holidays Food Drive” during Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur in the early fall; they donate the food they collect to The Haven and the Listen Center.

Members of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation as well as the UVJC make time every month to prepare dinners at the Listen Center. These dinners, which are served at no cost, focus mostly on seniors and low-income families with children. In 2007, Listen volunteers served 13,000 people and in 2008, they expect to serve more than 17,000 meals.

St. Barnabas parishioners take a box to the Haven every week after their Sunday service. In fact, one very enthusiastic St. Barnabas parishioner bought eleven canned hams for The Haven before Thanksgiving. “She’s a very good hearted woman who has really embraced The Haven as a way of reaching out,” Beth Hilgartner says of the community-driven donator. The NCC’s Women’s Fellow­ship raffled off a hand-made quilt at the November 15th Holiday Bazaar in Tracy Hall; all of the money they raised helped buy frozen meat to supplement The Haven Food Shelf’s nonperishable food items. “The Women’s Fellowship raised around $1200 dollars last year,” Mary Brownlow says.

The younger children in the religious education program at St. Francis run a year-round food drive and take monthly trips to The Haven to deliver dry food and canned goods and sometimes gently worn clothes.

According to The Haven’s website, generous donations such as these have helped to “provide a week’s worth of food on 11,680 occasions to individuals from 1,401 different families.” People who need food can “shop” at The Haven’s Food Shelf, where they select from a wide range of non-perishable items, meat, and fresh produce. Families can take advantage of this program once a month; during their visit they receive a week’s worth of food. Norwich’s donations have helped The Haven offset this year’s 40 percent budget increase for food expenses.

St. Barnabas even donated pet food to The Haven this holiday season; during a regular Eucharist service in November, they did a “Blessing of the Animals.” On this Sunday, parish members brought pets who were invited to participate in a special, animal-friendly communion. “It’s a fun ser­vice in general. This year we had dogs, cats and even chickens,” Beth Hilgartner says. Members donated an “extra large” number of canned goods, along with pet food, that went to The Haven and the Upper Valley Humane Society.

Holiday Basket Helpers

Many Norwich churches also help with the Hartford/Norwich Holiday Basket Helpers. The Basket Helpers program is staffed entirely by volunteers, all of whom work to assemble and deliver fruit baskets to seniors and buy clothing and gifts for area children. Social agencies (such these Norwich churches) help to identify and refer households to the Basket Helpers; these families are also given food gift certificates to cover the cost of a holiday meal.

The Marion Cross School, NCC, St. Barnabas, the Unitarian Universalist Church and St. Francis all help to supply the content of the fruit baskets. St. Francis serves as both a collection site for canned goods and the location for assembling and delivering these baskets. Young children in the religious education programs at the Catholic church make cards and ornaments that go into the senior fruit baskets and older children help to deliver the baskets. Parishioners of St. Francis also choose to sponsor children through this program; they select a child and buy the items on his/her “wish list;” each child receives three pieces of clothing and two or three gifts for the holidays.

“It’s a wonderful way to spread joy,” one Norwich Congre­ga­tional parishioner says. “To think of what a difference those gifts make and how little it takes for us to provide them.”

The Unitarian Universalist  Congregation supplements their Holiday Basket project campaign with festive songs. “Our church has a group that goes to local nursing homes and sings Christmas carols,” Reverend Bruce Johnson says.

Norwich Full Gospel Voice Church makes sure to provide for families they know are in need. “If we are cognizant of someone with a need, we’ll take it on,” Pastor Goodrich says. “We try to be aware of needs around us to fill in the gaps that someone might have missed.” Members of this church often contact the police to see if they have any recommendations of families, or children, who might have “fallen through the cracks.”

Global Giving

In addition to supplying local children with toys, Norwich Full Gospel Voice Church sent toys overseas through the Samaritan’s Purse Operation Christmas Child organization. The Baptist church filled shoeboxes with presents for children based on a list of recommended age-appropriate gifts. Volunteers wrapped the shoeboxes—lids separately—and dropped them off in mid-November at the West Lebanon Baptist Church, which was this region’s designated drop-off site. After a brief stop in North Carolina (the program hub), the shoeboxes will be sent to children all over the world who would not otherwise receive holiday gifts.

The Hebrew School students at the UVJC—with the help of Hebrew School teacher Karen Manning—have also sent gifts abroad. The group has developed a relationship with a community in Serere, Uganda, where children have lost one or both parents to AIDS or civil war. The students have raised funds to purchase sweaters and seventy desks for new village schools. They recently decorated over 150 t-shirts for the Ugandan children.

The Unitarian Universalist Congregation members also give beyond US borders. Similar to the “Pounds of Pennies” program, the church distributes “Guest At Your Table” boxes (much like piggy banks) around Thanks­giving. Church members place the boxes on their table at home and work to fill it with spare change. The boxes are meant to remind parishioners to be thankful for all they have during the holiday season and to donate to those more in need. Shortly after Christmas, the Unitarian church members collect and donate the money to social service programs both in this country and around the world. One such recipient is UNICEF (United Nations Chil­dren’s Fund).

Despite the impact that our economy will have on everyone’s holiday plans this year, people have not forgotten one important holiday theme: give back. Nor­wich’s churches, as well as the UVJC, all seem to be following Mary Brownlow’s counsel: “The idea is to let people give however they want. Some people like to shop for a child’s gift, some people like to make monetary donations. Everybody has a different way of giving so we want to make that possible.”

And the giving doesn’t stop after the holiday season. St.

Bar­nabas parishioners are already thinking about a post-Christmas classical concert to benefit a local charity. No one doubts that needs —for food, fuel, or gifts—will increase this year, so everyone at The Norwich Times encourages you to follow the community trend of generosity. If you don’t have the money to donate, you can help with food collections or any of Norwich’s other efforts to make everybody’s holiday season merry.