Mission promotion & events

Parish food drive
Each year the people of St Hilary's & St Silas spend a day knocking on the doors of every home in our parish. The purpose is twofold. Firstly, we collect non-perishable food, which is then bagged and delivered to Anglicare's Mission House aid centre in Fitzroy. Secondly, we take the opportunity to speak to our neighbours, inviting them to church and talking with them about how Shac might meet some of their needs.

Mission Dinner
Every year in October a missions dinner is held to raise funds and awareness about the various missions and missionaries that St Hilary's & St Silas is involved with as well as social justice issues.

Social Justice Events
Each year we try to hold a social justice event to increase awareness, this year St Hilary's & St Silas hosted a west papuan seminar and art show to draw attention to the situation in west papua.

Pancake night
Every year on Shrove Tuesday a pancake night is hosted at St Hilary's for congregation members to get together, enjoy warm pancakes and hear about some of the mission work that is taking place in and through the church.

Fair Trade
The monthly Fair Trade stall at the church supports a fair trading system for tea and coffee producers in low-income countries. The stall is held between morning and evening services at John St. Purchases enable a greater percentage of profits to go back to small cooperatives in Sri Lanka, Colombia, East Timor and Papua New Guinea.

Advocacy
St Hilary's & St Silas is fortunate to have strength in our numbers. As a consequence there is significant value in promoting the signing of petitions through our congregations. In 2003 we supported the advocacy of several organizations including TEAR and the Barnabas Fund.

40 hour famine
St Hilary's & St Silas has a proud history of strong support for the World Vision 40 hour famine. It is promoted in all of our congregations and World Vision has recognised St Hilary's & St Silas as the top or second top fundraising church for three out of the last four years.