Olympian Effort! $30,000 for Cambodia
Episcopal News Service. January 23, 1980 [80025]
SEATTLE -- A success story in Christian response to the Cambodian emergency has been written recently in the Episcopal Diocese of Olympia. The Bishop of Olympia, the Rt. Rev. Robert Cochrane, has sent $30,000 to the Presiding Bishop's Fund for World Relief as the result of a two-month effort by Episcopalians in western Washington.
Managed by the Hunger Commission of the diocese, part of the national Hunger Network, the appeal came about through a coincidence of the commission planning a newsletter distribution and the Fund sending a telegram to Presiding Bishop's Fund diocesan representatives and hunger chairpersons across the country, asking them to assist their bishop's Cambodian appeal in any way possible.
Hunger Commission chairman, Mel Matteson, received the wire just as he was leaving home to take the newsletter copy to the printers. Scanning the message at stop lights on the way across town, the idea of combining an appeal from the bishop with the newsletter developed.
Bishop Cochrane's response was immediate and enthusiastic; an added face sheet with the appeal was on the press the following morning and by that afternoon volunteers were collating, stapling and folding nearly 16,000 of the four-page publication.
Ordinarily, the hunger newsletter, More Than FOOD FOR THOUGHT, is sent to parishes, missions and hunger liaison persons about the diocese. Desiring a saturation coverage, the commission had applied to Diocesan Council for permission to use the mailing list for the diocesan newspaper, covering nearly all household addresses in the diocese. Permission being granted, the newsletter was scheduled for a larger circulation than any previous edition and contained the appeal for gifts to the Cambodian Emergency Relief Fund.
Response was immediate and generous, now amounting to more than $2 per household in the diocese and still coming in. The first day of mail following distribution brought nearly $3,000 and now amounts to ten times that amount. Checks for $5, $10, $25 are supplemented by the occasional individual gift of as much as $1,000. Parishes and missions have been collecting as well and sending in their collective offerings.
Awareness of the appeal was raised again in the second month of the drive when the Rev. Todd Fast, editor of the Olympia Churchman, diocesan newspaper, reprinted the bishop's appeal together with a picture of Cambodian children on the front page of the December issue. Further reenforcement currently comes from a series of television and radio public service spots urging public donations to synagogue or church for Cambodian Emergency Relief.
The television series was the result of an ecumenical gathering to plan a concerted public appeal. Donations sent to designated banks are delivered to UNICEF, those to denominations to various organizations of their choice. Episcopal dollars are routed to the Presiding Bishop's Fund, which in turn works with such agencies as Church World Service and Oxfam.
During the same time, the Church at large responded to the urgent appeals to aid Indochinese people by contributing over $450,000 to the Presiding Bishop's Fund for this work.
Concurrent with the Cambodian appeal, Matteson pointed out, the hunger commission was also collecting funds for support of direct feeding programs within the diocese. While encouraging parish and mission participation in community programs, the commission has provided nearly twelve tons of frozen chicken and turkey for food banks throughout western Washington during the year with more than 40 percent of that going out during the final quarter of the year in response to need in areas struck by flood and labor difficulties, resulting in high traffic at area food outlets.
Noting his pride in his flock, Bishop Cochrane spoke at their diocesan convention of the fact that his people were second only to the Diocese of Los Angeles in the sponsorship of Indochinese refugee families. His flock is also doing very well in answering his appeal for Cambodian Relief!