During the past few weeks the Anglican Church of Paphos has provided much needed funds for local voluntary organisations and brought Christmas cheer to many individuals. From clothes-filled shoe-boxes for seamen to funding spectacles for refugees, presents for children of needy families and money for local charities.
For Seafarers who were far from home this Christmas, members of St Luke’s Church, Prodromi (one of the three church in the Anglican Church of Paphos), donated the contents for 25 gift-wrapped Christmas boxes for The Mission To Seafarers Centre in Limassol, to join those from other Parishes on the island. The Mission’s Chaplain and volunteers visited 15 ships in Port this Christmas. Some 160 Seafarers each received a box containing a wool hats, gloves or socks and a selection of toiletries and sweets. They were touched to know they had been remembered by strangers.
The congregation of Ayia Kyriaki, Kato Paphos responded promptly and very generously for the second year when asked to join with other churches in the Island to give 100+ children in the refugee camp at Kofinou a beautiful Christmas experience. Father Christmas accompanied by an elf or two distributed presents at a party complete with bouncy castle , face painting , glass motif painting and friendship bracelet making. Extra money raised by Ayia Kyriaki church was used to obtain spectacles for several refugees.
70 Christmas gifts were provided by members of the St Stephen’s congregation Tala through their “Giving (Christmas) Tree” project. The gifts were presented on 20th Dec by Ann Bailey of St Stephen’s (on left of photograph) to Mrs Helen Dagli (on right of photograph), the deputy head of the Department of Social Services in Paphos. The presents were distributed by Social Services staff to the children of needy families in Paphos later that day. Mrs Dagli had previously provided a list of the ages and genders (but not names) of the recipient children to enable the presents to be matched accordingly. Mrs Dagli and her staff were bowled over by the volume of the gifts, and expressed their extreme gratitude on behalf of the children who would receive them.
The Anglican Church of Paphos Annual Christmas Fayre held in December at the Monte Liza Wedding Venue in Mesogi Avenue, again raised more than 10,000 Euros for distribution to 23 local charities both large and small. More than 100 members of the three church congregations were involved in the event which has been on the fundraising calendar for some 30 years and raised over 250,000 Euros for charity.
