Missions

"What does the Lord require of you but to seek justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God" Micah 6:8

The members of Pilgrim Church, both adults of the congregation and the Church School are actively committed to serving God by serving others. We care about the hungry and the homeless. Our philosophy of mission is to help alleviate suffering and share the good news of God's love through our actions and our financial support.

Often people join the church because they have a desire to make a difference in the world. Our wide variety of mission projects provide volunteer opportunities for everyone in the congregation, children, and adults to make that difference.

PHILOSOPHY OF MISSION OF THE UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST 

For many of the partners who are doing and supporting the mission of the United Church of Christ in our nation and around the world, mission today means:

• Helping all people on God's earth to have the physical necessities of life: adequate food and shelter, clean water, immunization, and medical care.
• Helping all people to have the basic spiritual necessities of life: knowledge of God, community with others, work to do, hope for the future.
• Respecting the dignity and worth of each person, each neighborhood, each nation with whom we are partners.
• Providing education, from pre-school through professional school: teaching skills, building self-sufficiency and independence, developing everyone's God-given potential.
• Working to ensure that human power is used in ways God intends, to ensure justice and fairness among all people

At Pilgrim Church the mission effort of the church is supported by many people and many different committees.  Here are just a few of the mission initiatives that Pilgrim Church as a whole is or will soon be involved with:

1…..Equal Exchange coffee and tea are used for all church functions and their products are made available for sale at the church. We support this organization because it guarantees the producers a fair price.

2…..Through Bristol Lodge we provide dinner for homeless, poor or temporarily struggling people of the Waltham area. One day a month, twelve months a year members of Pilgrim cook, transport and serve food for often one hundred people.

3…..The village of Flores, Honduras is enthusiastically supported by various people and committees from our church. One mission is to supple clean drinking water to homes of the villagers. This is a long term project. Tom and Emily have been doing Medical care visits for a long time. (They could use even more help here in Lexington.)

4…..The Outdoor Church, run by three clergy-persons, meet no matter what the weather!  This is an inspiring effort. Some of our teen agers have attended their services. We collect necessities such as clean white soxs for the congregants of the Outdoor Church and provide from time to time gift cards for food.

5…..Habitat for Humanity this year is providing us with an opportunity to do a hands on project with their on-going building project on the Great Road in Bedford.

6....Pilgrim is supportive of the Communities Without Borders (CWB) Community School in Ngombe Zambia in many ways. Just one way is our committment to the formal teacher training of Nina Sakala while she continues her volunteer teaching of 40-50 children annually.

7…..Tar Creek Indian Reservation, Oklahoma is the destination for many book that we collect from time to time. We are supporting them with their grassroots literacy initiative.

8…..Speaking of collecting books! Every spring and again in the fall we bring books to be sold at a book fair. The bookworms among us love this! The moneys raised go toward mission projects related to Flores.

These are only a few of the mission initiatives that are happening at Pilgrim.