Care and Share Thrift Shoppes

Strengthening Meaningful Connections with Conference-Related Ministries

October 3, 2024 by Cindy Angela

by J. Eric Bishop, Souderton Mennonite Church 

To live more fully into the congregation’s mission statement, “Strengthening Meaningful Connections with Christ, Church, and Community,” Souderton (PA) Mennonite invited a Mosaic Conference-Related Ministry (CRM) to present each week during their Summer 2024 Sunday School elective series, Gifted to Serve.   

Sarah Bergren and Maggie Herrity from the Care and Share MCC Thrift Shoppes.

The CRM representatives presented a brief history of their organization and its purposes and goals. In an interview style format, they shared how their ministry nurtures discipleship, helps people grow in their gifts, and encourages service.  Many stories were included to illustrate an organization’s effectiveness. A congregation member connected to the organization served as host and interviewer. Some CRM representatives used media presentations and display tables. Each session began with a short teaching on spiritual gifts, led by a congregation member, which was the unifying theme among the nine Sundays.  

This elective series was designed by the Spiritual Formation Team, and the stated goals were that attendees would: learn about the work of Mosaic CRMs; think about how they are using their own time, energy, resources, and spiritual gifts, and if they are called to use them in different ways; and identify and celebrate the variety of gifts and ways people serve in order to glorify God.    

Tim Weaver Interviewing Marlene Derstine from the MCC Material Resources Center.

The primary challenge, the Spiritual Formation Team discovered, was drawing people to hear about organizations about which they believed they were already sufficiently familiar. Congregants involved with the CRM being represented (e.g., those who serve at the MCC Thrift Shoppe Care and Share), eagerly attended those sessions. But the turnout for the session about Quakertown Christian School was low, as no Souderton families have students attending there, and the adults who did attend no longer have children in the K-12 age range.   

However, the elective averaged 45 people each Sunday, and those who attended learned much and appreciated the candid leadership of those who shared. One Souderton Mennonite participant said, “I really enjoyed the summer elective. It was enlightening to hear about the good Kingdom-work being done through our CRMs. I didn’t realize there were so many, and it was encouraging to see how the message of Jesus is being proclaimed and lived out through Mosaic Conference by these ministries.”    

Representatives from the following CRMs participated in the elective series: 

Dock Mennonite Academy 
Mennonite Economic Development Association  
Peaceful Living 
Quakertown Christian School 
Living Branches 
Care and Share 
Spruce Lake Retreat 
Mennonite Central Committee Material Resource Center

Pastor Ken Burkholder interviewing Ed Brubaker from Living Branches.

J. Eric Bishop

J. Eric Bishop, PhD, taught both English and German at Christopher Dock Mennonite High School (now Dock Mennonite Academy) for 37 years. He currently serves two days a week as Director of Curriculum and Instruction at Quakertown Christian School. He also produces legacy books about local businesses. Eric is married to Linda Hostetler. Eric and Linda are active members of Souderton Mennonite Church.

Conference Related Ministries (CRM) Profile: Care & Share Thrift Shoppes

August 10, 2020 by Conference Office

In the mid 1970’s, several women and men in their thirties got thinking, “How can we take the Sunday morning message of serving others and put that call into action during the week?” After some brainstorming, Care & Share Thrift Shoppes in Souderton, PA was born.

Care and Share Thrift Shoppes in Souderton, PA donated over $1 million dollars to the work of Mennonite Central Committee in 2019.

From its very beginning, Care & Share has been in the Souderton (PA) Center on Route 113. Currently, there are 5 shoppes – Furniture, Clothing, Books, Variety, and the Outlet. Care & Share also has an online presence on eBay. We are grateful for the quality and volume of donations we receive from our generous donors. These donations have made us well known for selling “high quality” products.

The dollars spent at Care & Share impact thousands of lives. In 2019, over 200,000 transactions took place at our registers. Further, we were the first independent, non-profit thrift store in the US or Canada to give over one million dollars to charity in one calendar year (2019). Since 1975, over 19 million dollars have been given to Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) as a result of purchases at our shoppes.

Care & Share is not only about raising money for MCC. It stands as a place where community is built. We hear from customers and volunteers – Care & Share is “church” for them.

Volunteers at Care & Share Thrift Shoppes in Souderton, PA gladly display some of the variety of items for sale.

This non-profit business is run by 52 paid employees who bring an enthusiasm for empowering our volunteers who are the heart of Care & Share. It is the volunteer’s gift of time and talent that creates our success.

We welcome a wide range of volunteers – ages 8 to over 100 years old. Some join us through the more “traditional” route as they are looking for “something to do” in retirement. Volunteers also join us through a group, such as a youth, work, school, family, or service group. We host those who need to serve hours for court ordered community service. Other individuals are volunteering, with staff support, from 40+ organizations who work with folks with disabilities. They may come for one reason, but they stay because they found a home in the community.

The Care & Share community is greatly impacted by the pandemic. During the three months that we were closed, we did our very best to stay connected to our “community.” We shared inspiring phone calls, increased the distribution of our e-newsletter, and created a live cooking show on Facebook. Our community greatly missed us, almost as much as we missed them!

A group of summer volunteers at the Care & Share, which helps support Mennonite Central Committee.

By mid-June, we re-opened two shoppes, with modified hours, run by our paid staff. We are following the state guidelines with masks/face shields, social distancing, and increases in cleaning. These steps have added significant costs to our operation.

Fortunately, by July, we had enough volunteers to open another shoppe. Only 30% of our 1,000+ volunteer base has returned to serving. We will need many more helping hands, on a regular basis, to reopen all of our shoppes. We do not want our volunteers to return until they are comfortable to do so. We will be patient!

Please pray for the pandemic to end. Our customers, volunteers, and employees are struggling under the increased anxiety and isolation it is causing. Please pray that Care & Share can continue to be a light in our community. Please refer us as a place to volunteer. We can accommodate larger groups even with social distancing in place.

Please consider making a financial donation to MCC. The loss of donations from thrift shops and relief sales is causing MCC to rely on individual donors more than ever. Care & Share is grateful for your support.

Letting Go Ethically

March 27, 2019 by Conference Office

The Care and Share Shoppes in the Souderton Shopping Center are a part of the Mennonite Central Committee Thrift Shop Network.

If Marie Kondo has inspired you to tidy up this spring, consider these tips from Mennonite Central Committee (MCC), which runs a network of thrift shops across the United States and Canada, including the Care and Share Thrift Shoppes, a Franconia Conference Related Ministry.

Do your research. Ask your local thrift shop what items they accept before donating them. Some thrift shops don’t have the resources to accept furniture or electronics. Others may have an “upcycling corner” where they’ll accept items that are broken or missing pieces (like a puzzle or board game).
Clean your items before donating. Many thrift shops, especially those who depend on volunteers, don’t have the resources to clean or repair items. When your items are clean, they have a greater chance of being sold and avoiding the dumpster.
Don’t donate broken items or old TVs. Unless a thrift shop tells you differently, assume they don’t have the resources to repair broken appliances or electronics—and it could cost them more money to responsibly dispose of them. Instead, look for recycling programs through your city, energy provider or local box stores.
Be thoughtful. Would you give the item you want to donate to a friend or family member? If not, perhaps you need to think about a different way to reuse or recycle it.
Buy second-hand items as much as possible. While thrift shops are grateful for your donations, repeatedly buying and donating new clothes (“fast fashion”) does more harm than good. Thrift shops are often overwhelmed by donations of women’s clothing but are more likely to need men’s and children’s clothing.
Consider volunteering. MCC’s thrift shops are more likely to have the time and skills needed to ethically dispose of and recycle unsellable items if they have a strong volunteer base.

Volunteers receive donations at the Care and Shoppes.

MCC’s network of thrift stops are all working to handle donations responsibly, with concerted efforts to reduce waste and care for the environment. Most of the proceeds from the shops go to MCC’s “Most-Needed Fund,” which supports humanitarian efforts in local communities and around the globe, including relief and development, peacemaking, education, prison ministry and immigration advocacy. To see what’s happening at your local thrift shop, visit https://thrift.mcc.org/.

The Care and Share Shoppes are open for business, as well as for donating, Monday through Saturday — learn more at careandshareshoppes.org. They also have a variety of volunteer opportunities. Contact Suzanne Kratz (skratz@careandshareshoppes.org), Volunteer Manager, to learn more about becoming a part of the team!

Impacting the World One Sale at a Time

January 7, 2016 by Conference Office

by Colin Ingram

Care & Share Thrift Shoppes is a conference related ministry of Franconia Conference and an independent organization that is part of the Mennonite Central Committee Thrift Shop Network, a bi-national group of shops that support the mission of Mennonite Central Committee (MCC). According to Sarah Bergin, executive director of Care & Share, the mission of Care & Share is to seek to model God’s love and care for the earth and its people through recycling efforts and a positive shopping experience, with a purpose of funding MCC’s ministries around the world. Since 1976, Care & Share has given around 15 million dollars to MCC.

The Care & Share Thrift Shoppes opened in 1975 as one shop of 8,000 square feet. Today they have grown to 6 stores covering over 31,000 square feet at the Souderton Shopping Center off of Route 113 and Bethlehem Pike in Souderton, PA. Within their stores one can find furniture, used books and clothing; there is a variety store, a thrift outlet, and they operate a shop on ebay.

The shopping center where Care & Share is located is owned and operated by the Franconia Mennonite Conference Board of Missions and Charities, and Bergin notes “in the beginning each Franconia Conference church gave a financial contribution towards the rent.” She noted that the conference and congregations continue to support Care & Share through their donations and by volunteering in the clothing store on a certain day of each month, a system continuing from the founding days of the thrift shoppes.

The impact of Care & Share is felt both locally and worldwide. Locally, Care & Share provides affordable clothes and goods along with the employees and volunteers of the shoppes spreading God’s love through serving with kindness.

One shopper, Jacqueline from Abington, Montgomery County, who bought a baby stroller to bless others shared “when you walk in the store you get this warm vibe. You don’t get that in every store you walk in.” She said, “I like what they do… I think it’s the understanding of the faith that they have with God.”

Care & Share has always been a place of hospitality to those in need. Refugees have been given the chance to select what they need from the clothing shop free of charge. Bergin also says the thrift outlet within the shopping complex allows for affordability for any budget. Then the usefulness of the unsold clothes continues when the store gives them to the MCC Material Resource Center in Harleysville; the resource center ships hundreds of tons of basic supplies, such as blankets, canned meat, and kits, to people in need around the world every year. The items they receive from Care & Share are either bailed and sold to a buyer with the funds going to MCC or sent to people around the world in need of the items.

The scope of impact surpasses Care & Share’s locality, because of its funding to MCC. Therefore, Franconia Conference, alongside Care & Share, is contributing to minister in Africa, Asia, South and Central Americas, and everywhere MCC serves.

By partnering with Care & Share, the conference is feeding the hungry in Nepal, building water dams in Africa, and helping locals sustain themselves agriculturally in Bolivia, as A Common Place reports MCC is doing.

Bergin stresses that this work would not happen without the over 1,000 volunteers giving their time at Care & Share.

Florence Histand, who has volunteered as a donation sorter for over 10 years said, “I enjoy doing this, and I’m retired so I volunteer instead of sitting at home in a rocking chair.”

Most volunteers come from Franconia and Eastern District Conferences, and work alongside other volunteers from the Brethren in Christ Church and other denominations.

Not only is Care & Share helping those in need — they are also conscious of being good stewards of the earth and work to limit their environmental footprint. The thrift outlet within the Care & Share complex –clothes being sold in bulk by the pound — keeps things out of the landfill. Bergin says they also try to keep the clothing in the United States to save on the impact of fuel and shipping to the environment.

By providing affordable clothing, friendly service, and funding for MCC (and its worldwide ministry), and with environmental conservation in mind, Care & Share and Franconia Conference are engaging the world and empowering people to embrace God’s mission.

Bergin says, “To keep growing, and to keep giving to MCC and to keep supporting those programs, we continue to need resources from the community — your donations as well as your volunteer time.”

Continue the mission by attending Care & Share’s 40^th year gala April 26 at Calvary Church off of Route 113 in Souderton.

Visit their website for more information on how to support the ministry of Care & Share: http://www.careandshareshoppes.org/.

Climbing on: A farewell of gratitude and hope

July 28, 2010 by Conference Office

Jessica Walter, Ambler
jessawalter@gmail.com

As I prepared to write this, my last editorial for Intersections, I decided I needed to look back at some of the writing I have done for Franconia Conference in my almost four years of work and ministry here.

I began the writing portion of my work with an article in the now retired MennoLife. I wrote about how my faith and calling journey had been like rock climbing. My journey was one of questions and confusion and while I would cry out for help on what my next move, or hold, should be I often wouldn’t listen to God’s answer. Taking the leap of faith to grab ahold of the opportunity to work at Franconia was a move toward listening for me, one I have been greatful for.

Since that first article and those first few months of work I have gained many valuable experiences and knowledge. Franconia Conference not only hired me to work with communication and leadership cultivation it also invested in my leadership. I could not have asked for a better place to explore my leadership gifts, develop useful skills and contribute to the equipping of other leaders both young and old. I have felt truly valued and respected despite my age.

And as I spent time here my journey, my rock climb, became less confusing and some questions were answered. I am leaving my post at Franconia Conference with a better sense of who God is calling me to be, answered questions or not.

It is fitting that this issue largely features stories of ministries that have begun to take root throughout the conference because though I am leaving my role at Franconia my roots in the larger conference community run deep.

So deep that I am about to begin work in two ministries connected to Franconia Conference. In June I will become both the manager of Care and Share Thrift Shoppes’ soon to be opened bookstore and an Outreach Minstry Enthusiast/Pastor of Ambler Mennontie Church.

Like the beginning harvest at Living Hope Farm I have been harvested from the soil here at Franconia Conference to be re-planted in the larger community.

Like Rose Bender, God has used many hands to help mold, shape and guide me over the last four years of my life. Interactions with pastoral leadership throughout the conference, visits to many congregations, representing conference and young adults to the larger Mennonite Church, and aid in exploring seminary education have all shaped the creativity, hospitality, and hope that informs my leadership.

Like Lorie Hershey couldn’t have imagined she would be an ordained minister ten years ago I couldn’t have imagined that I would become both a store manager and pastoral leader. And yet the opportunities I have gained from my term at conference have prepared me for these new roles.

During my time at Franconia Conference two passages in the New Testament have shaped my faith and calling journey. Matthew 22: 37-40 Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”

And Matthew 13: 31-32 Here is another illustration Jesus used: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed planted in a field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but it becomes the largest of garden plants; it grows into a tree, and birds come and make nests in its branches.”

I leave Franconia Conference with the hope that we all will continue to invest in the leadership of young adults, to remember that its the small steps toward change and growth in our congregations that stick, to love God with all of ourselves and to let that love radiate out into love of ourselves and others and to plant the Kingdom of Heaven one mustard seed at a time.

Care and Share Thrift Shoppes

J. Eric Bishop

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