Hundreds of members of Noroton Presbyterian Church (NPC) participated in 28 community service projects around Darien on Sunday, April 30 for the second annual NPC Service Day.
The idea developed last year was for the church community to come together, all ages and stages, and serve their greater community.
“NPC Service Day was a wonderful opportunity for our congregation to serve our community,” Interim Senior Pastor, Rev. Dr. John Seiders said. “What a great joy it was to see children, youth, and adults caring for people and the larger community in which we live.
“In a day and age when people are polarized about all kinds of issues, it is our desire to actively care for our community and the people who are here.”
The day had projects for everyone, i.e. outside projects, sitting down projects, manual labor projects, etc. The idea was to have a wide variety of one to three hour shifts so that each member could sign up for one or more, either as a family or individually.
NPC also served some of their mission partners, such as a group doing yard work up at Pivot Ministries in Bridgeport, creating boxes of treats for our military, painting the dining room at Open Doors Shelter, knitting baby blankets for Hopeline, Pregnancy Resource Center and many creating gifts for children in Africa.
Other projects included: making and bringing baked goods to Darien first responders, cleaning up Weed Beach, the train station parking lots, visiting Waveney Care Center with the choir, passing out refreshments at the sports fields, cleaning up some of elderly members’ yards, visiting homebound members, and praying for our community and nation.
The day started with a Worship service at 8:30 a.m. and then individuals and families headed out to their projects. The volunteers returned at 4 p.m. for a service of celebration and reflection on the day.
“It was wonderful to witness the joy and energy as people shared stories from their day,” said Stella Clarke, NPC mission director.