Snooker used to promote Hadleigh church's Porch Project

 

"It's a real passion of mine to see the church going back to being the centre of the community," said the Reverend Martin Thrower.

 

He was inspired to start the Porch Project after having a dream. "It's not very often I get serious dreams," he told the BBC Radio Suffolk Sunday breakfast programme.

 

“I could see these young people sitting around in the porch. The church has huge doors, and I could see these doors opening, and these young people walking in and out. As they were doing that they were eating food and having things to drink. I looked at what I was supposed to be preaching about the following Sunday, and the reading happened to be the feeding of the five thousand - a story all about hospitality and having an opportunity to sit and chat with each other."

 

 

Revd Thrower came to Hadleigh in the summer of 2009 and was soon talking to the young people who congregate by the front of St Mary's. He discovered the previous youth drop-in centre had closed down several years before and attempts at starting a new youth club had been unsuccessful.

 

He decided to open the church up on Friday evenings and garnered 25 volunteers from the congregation to support the Porch Project.

 

"On the first night, I thought I can see the door opening and then these young people not putting a foot in, because it's pretty alien territory to them," said the Reverend. “But amazingly they came in in one whole hoard. We were offering free food and drink and they just came in and sat down and started chatting and talking to each other. It was a great start - we had about about 15 or 20. Now were are up to about 25 to 30, but we are in contact with about 50 or so teenagers."

 

"We've now put a three quarter sized snooker table at the back of the church which is quite radical really," said Revd Thrower. That's available for them to use at any time when the church is open, which is daylight hours. They are welcome to come in and in the main they are pretty well behaved. It's a real passion of mine to see the church going back to being the centre of the community and to meet the community need."