We are honored to partner with IOYS in support of the important work they do for the LBGTQIA2+ youth in our community. In 2025, we collected food and clothing donations, attended local school board meetings to show solidarity, donated clothing and accessories for the June Queer Prom and donated to their Christmas Market. IOYS also provided a class for our congregation on inclusive language and allyship. We also sponsored ($1000) and attended the AllyUp Breakfast Fundraiser Event in November. We participated in the annual pride parade, this year including Levi as our DJ.

Fresh Start Center visited our church early in the year to speak about the food insecurity in our community and the work they do to address it. In response, our congregation held several food drives and participated in the annual Falcon citywide food drive, volunteering to help sort donated food.

Tri-Lakes-Cares visited our church early in the year to discuss the challenges facing the Monument and surrounding communities, including food insecurity, rising housing costs and employment barriers, as well as the ways they are working to address these needs. In response, our congregation organized a food drive, collected pies for Thanksgiving meals and funded three months of their Adopt-A-Shelf Program.

We had the pleasure of meeting the individuals who founded Food Trucks Against Homelessness and Monument Women Against Homelessness during our annual garage sale. In addition to providing donated goods for their clients, we offered small grants to support their work serving individuals experiencing homelessness in our community.

We supported the Stable Strides Walk-A-Thon by serving as a sponsor and through individual members of our congregation also raising funds to support their work.

We were again able to provide four families with a traditional Thanksgiving meal, plus little gifts for the kids and gift cards to Walmart.

The PPLD Mobile Library has been parking in the BFCC lot for several years now and is one of the most used mobile libraries in the district. We also started partnering with them to host different events they provide for the community. In 2023, they presented Shakespeare’s Pericles to the community.

In March, 2024, the Colorado Springs Astrological Society talked about the upcoming April solar eclipse and passed out eclipse glasses.

In May we were able to provide them with several boxes of books and DVD’s from our annual garage sale to use.

We are excited to be partnering StableStrides who provide Health and Healing through horses! Two people from our congregation are very active volunteers there and led us on a project in July to get an arena ready for a photo session. They also provided a class to our church earlier in the year about the services they provide.

We are grateful to Westside Cares for all they do for our community! We helped them organize and repackage food and wipes for the unhoused in March 2024. On Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday, we gathered food items from the congregation for them to pass out to those in need. In May, we were able to provide them with socks and shoes that they are always in need of after our annual garage sale. In August, we donated water bottles and a case of water for them to hand out to their clients as it has been a hot summer.

IOYS presented a class to us early in the year regarding the use of pronouns. We also donated much needed clothes, including prom selections from our garage sale. In December, we donated gifts for their Christmas Marketplace.

We were able to donate to these community organizations from our garage sale:

Cross Fire Ministries

IOYS

Mobile Clothes Unit

PPLD

Stable Strides

We were able to provide a traditional Thanksgiving meal, little gifts for the kids and gift cards to Walmart for four families.

We donated candy and a couple boxes of Easter Eggs for their annual Easter Egg hunt. We also participated in the annual Trunk or Treat event.

We were pleased to be able to host the St. Andrew UMC Youth Group while they were in town to do their mission work. 15 people stayed with us.

We participated in the annual Colorado Springs pride parade.