A SOUTHAMPTON church has given more than £9,000 to charities, both at home and abroad.

New Community Church in Southampton has donated £9,000 to three worthy causes that support children and families, with Southampton Children’s Hospital Charity, Families First Southampton, and Edith’s Home each receiving a share of that amount based on the proportion of votes they received from church attendees.

Following their Sunday Bible-teaching series on giving and generosity, and as a way of expressing their belief in the importance of being generous to others as a response to the generosity of a good God, New Community Church pledged to increase their organisation’s giving, choosing to support other charities and projects that make a real difference in people's lives.

Agreeing to give away ten percent of their unrestricted income this financial year, New Community Church decided that £9,000 of this would be given to other worthy causes chosen by people attending their church.

Church attendees nominated the causes that were closest to their heart, and from the nominations three worthy projects were chosen.

Church attendees were then invited to indicate through a token system which cause they’d most like to support. Each of the three causes received a proportion of the £9,000, depending on the amount of tokens they received. The amounts given were as follows:

• £3150 to Southampton Children’s Hospital Charity’s Emergency and Trauma Department Appeal, a campaign to raise £2million towards a new state-of-the-art emergency and trauma department for children.

• £3060 to Families First Southampton, an organisation supporting fathers to remain involved in the care of their children, and supporting healthy family relationships.

• £2790 to Edith’s Home, a project working with HIV/AIDS orphans in the community of Ngora in Uganda.

Theo Amer, Executive Leader of New Community Church, said, “It’s such a privilege, as an organisation, to be able to be generous with what we have been given. Children and young families make up a large part of our congregation, so we’re particularly pleased to be able to support the valuable work of these three fantastic causes as they make a real difference to the everyday lives of children and families in Southampton and further afield.

“Southampton Children’s Hospital Charity is a project that is especially close to our hearts, with several of our families having benefitted directly from its work in enhancing the care and treatment of patients in the children’s hospital’.”

You can find out more about New Community Church at www.newcommunity.org.uk.