Last breakfast of year held

The last monthly pancake breakfast held for the year. PHOTO/STEPHEN PARKER

Event helps others and is a good time to get together:

For the New Beginnings Centre, helping others is part of the mission.

On the last Sunday of the month for the past two years the church has put on a free pancake breakfast for those who want to head along, and this Sunday was the last one for the year.

Paul Groot, member of local church New Beginnings Centre, said the last pancake breakfast for the year went really well.

"For us it's a local outreach- for the church it's our local mission. It's a good time for the community just to get together."

The last monthly pancake breakfast held for the year. PHOTO/STEPHEN PARKER

Mr Groot said it started through the fellowship. Pastors Keith and Lyn Srew had a vision for feeding the homeless and the idea grew from there. He said when it started they had about 30 people come and now, two years on, they had 300 to 400 people show up each month.

"Anybody can come, we get all sorts. We get people who are down and out, then we get some kids as well, a lot of families come down. For some of them it's the only meal they eat together. We haven't had any problems, even with the 300 to 400 people that come every month."

He said it was all paid for by the church and would start up again in January.

Mr Groot said the church also did about 100 food parcels at this time of year.

He said they did not do it for recognition but they would encourage other fellowships into doing something similar.

"It's full-on, but whoever wants to help can and it's not always people from the fellowship helping."