Jo and Julian have been involved in many campaign and fundraising projects over the last 30 years.
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Meet Parish volunteers Jo and Julian from the Brentwood Diocese.
Jo’s father inspired her to take social action and become involved with SVP, J&P issues, Life Rallies for social justice.
Jo and husband Julian were originally asked to volunteer by the ‘social concerns group’ in their previous parish (in the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton) 30 years ago. This group was an umbrella for social charities that included SVP and CAFOD. In those days this involved organising Fast Day collections, handing out envelopes but without talks.
In 2000, their parish sought a millennium project and began supporting a new parish in Kasanka, Zambia—raising over £40,000 and continuing this partnership today. Jo and Julian have also helped lead major campaigns, including Cancel Debt and Make Poverty History, and organised parish Fast Day talks and fundraising activities.
Connecting with communities around the world and making connection with these communities helps to focus less on ourselves.
As part of the LiveSimply group in Surrey, Jo coordinated activities and encouraged other members of the group to run them, for example plant swap and sale, flower arrangers looked at how eco friendly the flowers were. They both organised cake sales, quiz nights, concerts, emergency appeal buckets. In 2020, Jo and her daughter Anna-Maria took part in the 2.6 challenge and walked 26,000 steps in one day and raised £450 for the CAFOD Coronavirus Appeal. They featured in an article in the Surrey Advertiser: “Fundraising Mum and daughter take steps to aid appeal”. As it was lockdown, they walked separately: Jo in Godalming, Surrey, and Anna-Maria in East London
Listening to partners from Bangladesh, speaking about slave labour and how the support from CAFOD was inspiring. It is important for parishes to have connections and to see the difference their donations make. The parish receiving the LiveSimply award was a big achievement, say the couple. Jo also really enjoyed CAFOD's Voices of Change podcasts too.
Matthew 25:40 expresses this perfectly for Jo and Julian: “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
Volunteering for CAFOD is a great way to get involved in your parish and put faith into action.
