Social Ministry Committee

Mike Kelly, chair

Members: Deborah Blank, Gary Blank, Betty Hildreth, Pastor Holmes, Julian Mann, Savistria Lucau, Sandy Paur, Al Riordan, Sue Woodling.


Four members of Holy Trinity arrive at the Helen Wright Center for Women on a warm Friday night with bags and boxes of home-cooked food for a crowd. After greeting staff and residents, they get organized in the small kitchen, chatting with staff and residents who stop by to ask about the dinner menu. Following devotions, they serve plates of food to forty women, many of whom return for seconds or ask for small baggies of leftover salad to take for lunch the next day. Some return just to talk. As the Holy Trinity prepares to depart, they meet a young woman outside who is traveling south, alone and with little money. Quickly, two of the members return to the kitchen to assemble a bag lunch for her while the others talk outside with a resident, providing encouragement as she shares her determination to hold down a job and make better life choices. It is dusk when the group from Holy Trinity departs, leaving behind good wishes for both women, one who will stay in Raleigh and one who is traveling to Florida. Both are hoping for a better life.

Holy Trinity has a commitment to provide and serve meals every fifth Friday at the Helen Wright Center, which each year provides transitional shelter for about 520 homeless women. The center is under the umbrella of Urban Ministries of Wake County, which Holy Trinity has supported for 25 years, both financially and in volunteer service. The ARK bags that Holy Trinity collects every month help stock the food pantry at Urban Ministries, which provides food for about 19,000 people in Wake County each year.

Urban Ministries also operates the Open Door Clinic, which provides free health care and pharmacy services to indigent and uninsured people. Holy Trinity members have volunteered at the clinic; more recently, we have also used its services as part of our refugee and asylee ministry.

The Helen Wright Center is just one of the ministries that Holy Trinity supports. Under the umbrella of the Social Ministry Committee, Holy Trinity is committed to many additional ministries, through service, advocacy, and monetary donations. Many of these ministries are related; all revolve around the often intertwined issues of hunger, homelessness, peace and justice, and refugee and asylee support and advocacy.

We are active in the following ministries:

  • Hunger and Homelessness
    • Alliance of AIDS Services Carolina (AASC) Food Pantry: providing and delivering non-perishable food for several weeks in the fall and again during Lent.
    • Angel Tree: providing and delivering gifts to clients of AASC, PLM-Families Together, and Lutheran Family Services.
    • Bread for the World: making the congregation aware of hunger-related crises and provide opportunities to act for change, for example, through "offerings of letters" and Bread for the World Sunday.
    • Clothing Closet: collecting and delivering clothing for distribution by the First Baptist Church of Raleigh.
    • CROP Walk: walking ourselves and funding other walkers to support local hunger-fighting agencies and the international relief and development efforts of Church World Service.
    • Habitat for Humanity-Lutheran Coalition: helping to build affordable homes in partnership with families living in poverty.
    • Meals on Wheels: delivering meals to those who are homebound.
    • PLM-Families Together: serving on the Board of Directors, providing support for life skills events, and participating in other volunteer activities; also providing basic needs for Samaritan Inn, an apartment that houses out-of-town families who have critically ill family members at Wake Medical Center.
    • Urban Ministries of Wake County: Helen Wright Center, ARK bags for the Food Pantry, Open Door Clinic, Crisis support.
  • Peace and Justice
    • Congregations for Social Justice: representing Holy Trinity at meetings that bring together other faith-based groups to act locally for social justice.
    • Legislative Alerts: collecting information about relevant legislation to disseminate to the congregation.
    • Lutheran Peace Fellowship: attending monthly meetings; attending local prayer vigils for peace in the Middle East; gathering for prayer at executions; actively advocating non-violence (for example, at local high schools).
    • Peace Booth: staffing the booth at the NC State Fair to make visitors aware of church statements on peace and justice.
  • Refugee and Asylee Support and Advocacy
    • African Outreach: a non-standing subcommittee providing transportation, mentoring, tutoring and other support as needed to asylees.
    • Refugee Resettlement: typically in partnership with Lutheran Family Services.

We also have financial oversight for the following Parish extension benevolences:

African Outreach Filling in the Gaps (FIGS)
Hospice of Wake County Local Lutheran Churches
Lutheran Family Services Meals for Persons with AIDS
Meals on Wheels Peace and Justice Concerns
PLM-Families Together Reconciling in Christ Task Force
Social Ministry Discretionary Fund "Sing for Joy" Radio Program
Urban Ministries of Wake County

We on the Social Ministry Committee are truly humbled and challenged to serve and advocate for the "least of those," and invite you to join our committee. The work we do "overflows" the bounds of a committee, so we also thank you for serving as an extension of the committee, whether it is walking in the CROP Walk, building Habitat houses, providing gifts for the Angel Tree, or delivering meals to the homebound in our community. Please continue to volunteer for these ministries and others.