Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand:

Every week should be Volunteer Awareness Week says Church

Volunteer Awareness Week is an important event, and it highlights how we need to show volunteers each day throughout the year just how important and appreciated they are says the Right Rev Dr Graham Redding, Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand.

Our Church, our communities and our nation would not be what they are without the dedicated help of volunteers. We benefit enormously from their passion, their skills and talents. They need to feel appreciated and valued for what they give every day, says Graham.

Most of the Presbyterian Churchs 30,000 regular church-goers either volunteer at their church or within their community or both.

A recent NZ study estimated that more than 70 percent of volunteers in religious activities also donated to other sectors of the community.*

A US study found that religious people donate more, and volunteer more, than non-church goers, giving nearly four times more dollars per year, and volunteering more than twice as often.**

Graham says that Presbyterian churches would not be able to run the many community programmes that they do without the support of volunteers.

As a charitable organisation the Presbyterian Church relies heavily on volunteers to help run its churches and the community programmes that take place in them. We are sincerely gratefully for our volunteers.

Graham says that four centrally located Presbyterian churches in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington and Dunedin will be taking that thank you to the streets lunchtime Tuesday 16 and Wednesday 17 June, by giving away thank you muffins to people passing-by the churches.

Its our way of publicly drawing attention to the great work that all volunteers do. It gives us a chance to say a face-to-face thank you to people for any volunteering they have ever done, and get people thinking about how they can volunteer.

ENDS

Notes to reporter:

The Presbyterian Church is a registered charity and the third largest denomination in Aotearoa New Zealand, with more than 400,000 people identifying as Presbyterian in the 2001 Census, and 30,000 regular church attenders

* Promoting Generosity Project, Office for the Community and Voluntary Sector. June 2008.

** In the year 2000, religious people (the 33 percent of the population who attend their houses of worship at least once per week) were 25 percentage points more likely to give charitably than secularists (the 27 percent who attend less than a few times per year, or have no religion). They were also 23 percentage points more likely to volunteer. When considering the average dollar amounts of money donated and time volunteered, the gap between the groups increases even further: religious people gave nearly four times more dollars per year, on average, than secularists ($2,210 versus $642). They also volunteered more than twice as often (12 times per year, versus 5.8 times).

In 2000, religious people were 10 percentage points more likely than secularists to give money to explicitly nonreligious charities, and 21 points more likely to volunteer. The value of the average religious households gifts to nonreligious charities was 14 percent higher than that of the average secular household, even after correcting for income differences.

Religious people were also far more likely than secularists to give in informal, non religious ways. For example, in 2000, people belonging to religious congregations gave 46 percent more money to family and friends than people who did not belong. In 2002, religious people were far more likely to donate blood than secularists, to give food or money to a homeless person, and even to return change mistakenly given them by a cashier.

- A Nation of Givers. The American: The Journal of the American Enterprise Institute. March/April 2008.
http://www.american.com/archive/2008/march-april-magazine-contents/a-nation-of-givers

ENDS