The UCKG is committed to working together with other organisations, Churches and faith groups for the benefit of the community.
Below are some of the charities we help.
Barnardos works with the most vulnerable children and young people, helping them transform their lives and fulfil their potential. They are the UK’s leading children’s charity, supporting over 100,000 children and their families through more than 300 projects in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.
The UCKG helps this charity by organising collections of clothes and books which are then donated to Barnardos to be sold in their shops to raise money to fund their ongoing projects. These include working with families in a variety of ways such as fostering and adoption, and working to combat child poverty and homelessness.
With around 380,000 single homeless people in Great Britain, (including those staying in hostels, B&Bs, squats, on friends' floors and in overcrowded accommodation), homelessness cannot be ignored. In its aim to help the homeless, the UCKG members donate thousands of clothes to be distributed by Crisis UK, one of Britain's largest homeless charities.
Mr Robert Evans, Resources Manager at Crisis is very grateful with UCKG's clothes contribution: "Your support means that we can help even more homeless people through the winter and Christmas period. So thank you to all of you who share our concerns for homeless people and who have contributed to make homeless peoples' lives that little bit easier."
The work of the National Blood Service is entirely dependent on the goodwill of donors. In the past fifty years, the lives of millions of people have been saved by a simple, straightforward medical procedure: The transfer of healthy blood from one person to another.
The UCKG HelpCentre recognises the great need for blood donors and therefore encourages its members to donate blood at each given opportunity.
The National Blood Service sets up a clinic in the Rainbow Theatre, allowing Church members as well as those living in the area to donate blood.
Each person's donation, can be used to save the lives of up to three people! What a great joy to be able to help one of the many sufferers of anaemia, chronic disorders, haemolytic disease, thalassaemia, sickle cell, acute blood loss, burns, leukemia, and much more.
The UCKG HelpCentre took part in the National Blood Pressure Testing Week in September 2003 organised by the Blood Pressure Association (BPA). By encouraging people to get themselves checked regularly, high blood pressure can be avoided and therefore reduce the risk of a stroke in the future.
The UCKG HelpCentre assisted the BPA and set up an area within the Rainbow Theatre known as a "Pressure Station". Volunteer nurses took the blood pressure of approximately 500 people free of charge in that week alone.
Approximately 60% of those attending were non-church members.
This is a service that the UCKG HelpCentre will continue providing whenever the BPA requires.
The UCKG HelpCentre teamed up with the Cinema Theatre Association (CTA) at their request, to screen a movie in celebration of the wonderful restoration work carried out on the Rainbow Theatre (previously the Astoria Cinema) which was entirely sponsored by the UCKG HelpCentre members.
The Guardian newspaper described the Theatre as 'jaw dropping' and featured an interview with chairman of the CTA, Mr Richard Gray who said the building was "one of the greatest cinemas of its kind in Europe" and described its restoration as astonishing. He said, "The church has done a really wonderful job restoring it."
Over 1,300 non-church members packed in to view the Rainbow and watch the film 'Sunset Boulevard'. Future screenings are anticipated.
The Rainbow Theatre is open for all, regardless of whether people are church members or not. The public are always welcome to come in and simply view the building if they wish.