2020 Contribution Statements are now available. Please stop by the black table in the Café and check for your statement.  Any remaining statements will be mailed on January 25th.

Contact Kathy Wilhelm in the church office if you’d like it mailed right away.

Akron Pregnancy Services (APS) is having their annual Baby Bottle Boomerang fund raiser.  St. Luke’s has long supported APS and their ministry to those seeking pregnancy, parenting and life-skill counseling, maternity and baby supplies. 

You can get your baby bottles in the Café after the service, January 17th, or you can pick one up at the church office during the week and fill them with spare change, bills, or checks.   Please return your brimming bottles to the Café by February 14th.

If you want to know more about APS or what you can do to help, there are flyers on the Welcome Board as you exit.

There are 25 to 30 Tent Communities in the Akron vicinity and when the temp falls to 15 degrees the homeless in Akron need shelter and protection.

Through our connects with Rahab Ministries, St. Luke’s is offering assistance to the Peter Maurin Center which has partnered with Continuum of Care and will open a Warming Center in a building recently vacated.  This building, at 111 Voris Ave., is near the Grant Street Post Office.  

The temp is predicted to reach 15 degrees by Jan. 19, so that is the target date for opening the Warming Center.  The Peter Maurin Center will provide floor mats about 3 inches thick and volunteers will welcome each guest who will be lent a kit with a pillow, sheets and a blanket.  If they return the next night,  They will be able to reuse the same kit, 

Peter Maurin Volunteers are planning for 25 to 40 homeless people, who need to come in to stay warm and still practice social distancing.  They will be given masks, hot soup or chili, hot coffee/tea etc.    

This outreach to the homeless will continue every very-cold night through February.  Volunteers from Peter Maurin will be at the Warming Center at 6:30 each evening to set up the room and put out a simple hot meal.  At 7:30 the building will open, and the volunteers will serve the food, clean up after the meal, and leave.  Then the guests will be bedded down, and two policemen will watch over them all night.  In the morning another set of volunteers will be on hand to give the guests a simple breakfast and the building will close at 7:30 am. 

If anyone wishes to be a volunteer at the Warming Center or to know more about this opportunity, contact the church office for more information.

If you are unable to volunteer, you can still donate needed supplies for this outreach.  These  supplies can be brought to St. Luke’s and placed in the large chest in the church foyer.  We will deliver donations to the Peter Maurin Center on Old Main St. Akron.

Here are some of the common supplies the homeless need to survive:

• Socks – winterweight
• Hats – stocking cap and/or full mask style
• Long underwear – men’s and women’s L, XL and XXL
• Blankets
• Hand and feet warmers 
• Sleeping bags, rated for 30 degrees or colder
• Tents – (two-person Coleman Sun-Dome type)
• Gloves
• Tarps – 10-by-12-feet, brown or camo
• Monetary donations are also accepted.