Volunteer Ministers and the Churches of Scientology Disaster Response Use Personal Skills to Help During the Pandemic
Helping to fight the unseen enemy COVID-19, volunteers take to their sewing machines and hand carts to help those in need.
Our volunteer ministers are thinking outside the box and helping as we can from our homes”
WASHINGTON , DC, USA, April 16, 2020 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Written By Rev. Susan Taylor — Rev. Susan Taylor, Churches of Scientology Disaster Response
Personal stories of helping others during the pandemic are being shared by the Volunteer Ministers of the Church of Scientology in various parts of the country.
In the northwest, Rev. Ann Pearce and her Volunteer Minister team from the Church of Scientology in Seattle, WA, continue to work with their community, getting donations of food supplies delivered each week to local non-profits who work with the homeless population. “Organizations in the area including the Queen Anne Food Bank in Seattle have seen the number of individuals in need of basic food staples soar recently,” said Rev. Pearce. “Our volunteers have started a food donation campaign, delivering supplies to local groups weekly, and are also at work on a drive to get new socks donated as there is a need for them in the community.”
In the greater Seattle area from Mill Creek to Tacoma - some of the church’s volunteer seamstresses have been sewing hundreds of masks for distribution to non-profits who are on the front lines helping the public. “Health professionals are recommending saving surgical masks for medical staffs, so church volunteers are making reusable cloth masks for non-medical use as a health measure,” Rev. Pearce said.
Copies of the church’s booklet, "How to Keep Yourself & Others Well" are also being provided by the church as a simple training and prevention measure on cleaning and sanitizing to help keep the public safe and well. For a free copy of the booklet go to https://www.scientology.org/staywell/booklets/
Rev. Julie Brinker from the Church of Scientology in Nashville, TN, said, “With the Nashville community under a ‘Safer-at-Home’ order by Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee since late March, and the Mayor urging residents to wear masks in public settings such as visits to the doctor or grocery store, people are in need of masks. We wanted to help. A local volunteer minister seamstress stepped up in a big way to get masks to the people while also making donations of masks to emergency responders and nursing staff,” Rev. Brinker explained. “She turned her home into a ‘tiny cloth mask factory,’ and announced this to her Instagram following on April 2nd. Since this announcement she has received hundreds of orders for masks. She is most proud of how she's been able to get masks to those who most need them on the front lines. Among those who are now proudly wearing her masks are Salvation Army volunteers who are out and about delivering goods.”
In another part of Nashville, long time volunteer minister, Jennifer Pantermuehl, is working with the local hospital who put out a call for volunteers to help deliver food to those in need. Several times a week she takes her car and her pull cart to the hospital, picks up the donated food and goes door-to-door delivering it to those in need. “It is the least I can do for my neighbors here in our wonderful city. We have been hit with several disasters recently including a tornado and now the virus. My colleagues and I love to help and have worked out how to do this so we do not put ourselves or those we are serving in danger. Yes, we are wearing our masks and our gloves and give a wide berth to anyone we meet. The food is dropped on the door step, we step back, wave, give them a big smile behind the mask and wish them well,” said Jennifer.
The Volunteer Ministers (VM) program was launched more than thirty years ago, in response to an appeal by Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard.
Noting a tremendous downturn in the level of ethics and morality in society, and a consequent increase in drugs and crime, Mr. Hubbard wrote, "If one does not like the crime, cruelty, injustice and violence of this society, he can do something about it. He can become a VOLUNTEER MINISTER and help civilize it, bring it conscience and kindness and love and freedom from travail by instilling into it trust, decency, honesty and tolerance."
Volunteer Ministers have also trained and partnered with over 1,000 different groups, organizations and agencies around the world, including the Red Cross, National Guard, Army Cadets, Salvation Army, Boy Scouts, Rotary Clubs, civil defense and disaster management agencies, YMCAs, police and fire departments of dozens of cities and towns and hundreds more national and regional groups and organizations.
“Our volunteer ministers are thinking outside the box and helping as we can from our homes,” said Rev. Susan Taylor, National Director, Churches of Scientology Disaster Response.
Rev. Susan Taylor
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