Youth from Steinbach churches will be going door-to-door this week collecting food for South East Helping Hands.

Kyle Penner is the Assistant Pastor at Grace Mennonite Church. He notes around 10 local youth groups are participating this year, collecting food for the Farm Credit Canada Drive Away Hunger Campaign.

"In previous years we picked one night and we blitzed the whole town. Now, because of COVID restrictions, we are trying to space ourselves out a little more and so each youth group has been given certain sections of the whole city and they are picking the night [of the week]. By now, you should have received a little paper in your door saying which night your collection is and then that evening you can either put your food out on your front step and we can either collect or if it is not there then we can ring the doorbell," he says.

Penner says the foodbank has come to rely on the huge influx of donations that come from this youth event as thousands of pounds of food are collected each year. He notes it is also a great way for youth to get involved.

"For us to give these kids a chance to learn practices of generosity and to see how caring our community is, that is always a gift.” He adds “I think it is great that kids get to see their friends from other churches being a part of it, I think it is great for them to see churches taking their responsibility to feed the hungry very seriously, it is all around a great evening for everybody."

 

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 Written by Kenton Dyck