Where?
The King’s Church has been in Addlestone since 1917. It’s current building, built in the late 1960’s, is situated on Marsh Lane and is a 5-10 minute walk from the town centre. The surrounding area is predominately made up of residential housing. Find us by clicking here.
What?
Our vision is to build a place of safety in our community for those who feel they don’t belong or have nothing to contribute, whether through, illness, poverty, mental health issues, or just personal circumstances. We want to help them find a place where they belong and have some self worth: a central place bringing hope with a distinctive Christian ethos. It is to act as a meeting place, a drop-in centre, a central source of information for those finding it difficult to live in this highly complex world, and involve the local community, as far as possible, with shared responsibility for meeting local social needs.
Our hope is that we will be a visibly welcoming centre for the community, offering such things as:
– A community kitchen with regular meals cooked and shared together with those who are currently struggling financially – the “fEAsT”
– Rooms for prayer
– A Social Services Contact Centre
– A place where single mothers can meet one another and have access to clothing and toys for their children
– A drop-in centre for children and teenagers needing help with homework with access to computers
– A computer suite for adult education classes and tutoring to help with re-entering the workplace
– A counselling facility concerned with debt, parenting, marriage, mediation, and general citizenship
– A meeting point for adult special-interest groups
– A place of worship
– A centre for family evenings
– A venue that is available for other local community groups to use whose ethos is similar to ours
– A venue that is available to the local community to use and own.
Why?
Although it is affluent in parts, Addlestone also has considerable pockets of deprivation. As many as 1 in 3 local children are deemed to be living in poverty.
Single parent families lack adequate support, children without internet access are at a distinct educational disadvantage, adults lack skills to enter the workforce and there are parents who are struggling to feed and clothe their children. These are all issues on our doorstep and we desire to see our building used to tackle some of them.
How?
At the end of 2012 and beginning of 2013 we embarked on an extensive building renovation project, having raised £75,000 in a little over a year. The centre is now properly equipped to be able to accommodate our vision.