SALISBURY Foodbank has revealed that demand has increased from 2022, with more children than ever in need of food parcels.
They recently received a special visit from the Bishop of Salisbury who 'urged everyone to remember the joy contained in the promise of Christmas'
With the cost-of-living crisis still rife, volunteers were busy preparing special Christmas parcels for hundreds of households this year.
Manager Maria Stevenson said: "The number of people having to use the foodbank has grown, with more children than ever before in need.
"This includes people from working families who are being forced to access the services more and more due to the cost of living crisis."
The team has provided 69,255 meals so far in 2023, up from 64, 818 meals in 2022.
The Foodbank will be delivering 200 Christmas parcels of food and festive offerings to those particularly in need, in addition to its usual emergency food parcels, which contain three meals a day for three days.
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One hundred volunteers support the Salisbury food banks. These include Claire Tunnicliffe and Caron Hitchen, who are part of the Avon River Team of churches on the Salisbury Plain.
Claire said: “We talk at Christmas about God being here with us, in Jesus, and this work at the foodbank is about showing people God is with them.”
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Bishop Stephen said: "It is a very challenging Christmas for many, at home and overseas."
He urged everyone to remember the joy contained in the promise of Christmas, the birth of Jesus – that we are not alone.
In his Christmas message, he said: “In many ways, it’s just as simple as that. We celebrate these days because this greatest gift to humanity is about God coming and being part of us in our human existence. That’s what we celebrate at Christmas, that’s the real joy, that God is not far away, that God does not, not understand, God here, is with us.”
Bishop Stephens's message can be heard here.
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