Service & Outreach

Every night of the year, as many as 150 people come to the Operation Nightwatch Dispatch Center on 14th and Jackson with hopes of getting a bed for the night in one of Seattle’s emergency shelters. The also get a hot meal prepared by volunteers. The Epiphany meal team is on duty the third Saturday of odd-numbered months. Parishioners also make sandwiches that the Nightwatch staff distribute at tent encampments.

At Sound Foundations NW, volunteer construction crews build quality temporary homes for Tiny Home Villages managed by the Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI). For people who might otherwise be under a tent on the sidewalk, these communities offer safe, dry, warm housing (with lockable doors!) and shared kitchen, laundry, and sanitary facilities. LIHI also provides case managers and other services to help residents land jobs and move on to permanent housing. Epiphany’s crew gathers at the Sound Foundations “Hope Factory” in South Seattle on the second Saturday of the month.

Many young people living on the streets of the University District depend on Teen Feed for a hot meal and help getting off the streets and into jobs and housing. Since the 1980s, Epiphany’s Teen Feed crew has met at a University District church to prepare a meal on the fourth Thursday of the month.

The YWCA provides a range of services to help women, many fleeing domestic violence, find housing, jobs, and independent, stable lives for themselves and their children. Epiphany has partnered with the YWCA since the 1970s when our parish began providing Christmas gifts for families in YWCA programs. We continue this tradition today, each year collecting back-to-school supplies and holiday grocery and gift cards. Epiphany also supports the YWCA’s Angeline’s Day Center for Women in Belltown. Your donations to the Hunger Basket Sunday mornings buy fresh produce for its Central Area Food Bank in Madrona.

AFEDJ raises financial support for the schools, hospitals, and centers for children with disabilities that are owned and operated by the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem, which encompasses the Anglican parishes of Palestine, Israel, Jordan, and Lebanon. These institutions serve everyone, irrespective of their religion, ethnicity or ability to pay. Epiphany began its support of AFEDJ in 2014 with a gift for the Jerusalem Princess Basma Centre, which serves children with a range of disabilities.

The Haiti Micah Project was founded in 2005 by Father Joseph Constant, an Episcopal priest (and The Rev. Doyt Conn’s fellow seminarian), to rescue destitute and orphaned children from the streets of Mirebalais, Haiti. With its community partner St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Haiti Micah provides food, clean water, loving residential care, medical treatment, and educational and vocational training for the children in its group home. Epiphany began its support of Haiti Micah in 2012.

The Nicolás Fund for Education provides a secondary school education and other life-changing opportunities for children at Nicolás Christian School in a small town in the indigenous Mayan region of Guatemala. This area has been systematically exploited for hundreds of years and still suffers from the trauma of a 36-year civil war. Epiphany parishioners have visited this community since 2005, when Epiphany began a six-year partnership with the village of Belén through the Seattle nonprofit Agros International. Epiphany’s support of Nicolás Fund since 2016 provides scholarships for the children of Belén and other villages to attend Nicolás Christian School.

If you have questions about donations of any kind or would like to know more about Have a Heart, please contact Amanda Eap at amanda@epiphanyseattle.org.

• Your donations to the Hunger Basket on Sunday mornings (or to the Hunger Basket fund if giving through Epiphany’s web site) buys fresh produce for the YWCA Central Area Food Bank in Madrona. Epiphany has supported the food bank in this way since 2010.

• For the families living in the YWCA’s emergency shelters and housing facilities, Epiphany provides a little extra help several times each year. In August, we collect money to purchase school supplies and backpacks for children returning to school. In November and December, your donations provide families with holiday grocery and gift cards.

• Many local organizations are in constant need of socks, warm hats and gloves, feminine hygiene products, and small, travel-size toiletries such as toothpaste, shampoo, conditioner, shaving cream, deodorant, and other small comforts. Please drop these items in the labeled bin at the back of the church.

• Every February, the Service & Outreach Team invites you to Epiphany’s annual fundraiser for our church’s outreach ministries. The event begins with a short video program in the Church immediately followed by the beautiful service of Choral Evensong. Then the party begins in the Great Hall with complimentary food and drink. You and your friends (do invite them, please) will enjoy a lively evening while doing good things for our community. Look for announcements about this event in all the parish media starting in January.