Local bake sale helps global village

by Heather Di Marco

For the past 15 or more years St. Cuthbert’s Oakville has had an annual tradition. Early every December, we host our Annual Outreach Bake Sale.

Parishioners are invited to dust off their cookbooks and bake their favourite recipes to contribute to our sale. It is a very popular event; everyone is pleased to contribute their personal favourites. We have loads of goodies both sweet and savoury donated; enough to fill four or five tables.

The sale is advertised to the wider community. It is a fun day as friends, neighbours and parishioners come in to buy our wares and share our Christmas cheer.

All funds from the bake sale are donated to various outreach projects. For the past several years we have split the funds between two groups. Fifty percent of the funds raised help support the work of The Kerr Street Missions. One of the many good works of the Kerr Street Missions is to offer weekly hot meals to those in need in Oakville. St. Cuthbert’s outreach groups host four suppers per year serving 50 to 100 or more guests at each meal. The meals are delicious, nutritious, lovingly prepared and served by our diligent volunteers.

The other 50% of the funds go to the Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund (PWRDF).

As important as our local outreach commitments are, the Outreach Committee feels it equally important to help out, in our small way, beyond our own local borders. PWRDF seems a natural fit. It is an Anglican organization with a global mandate.

Our annual bake sale is a great vehicle to do both good works: help others within our town and help globally through PWRDF as the global citizens that we are.

Heather Di Marco has organized the annual bake sale at St. Cuthbert’s Oakville for the past 12 years.