On 5th November 2024, Holy Trinity Church opened its doors as a Youth Café for the first time. Seven young people came that evening, but since that first night it has grown to around 70 attending each week.
Everything at the café is free! Young people aged 11-16 enjoy hot chocolate and toast, a variety of crafts and games and some different themed nights, including a film night with hotdogs and popcorn at Christmas, a Pancake Party, an Egg Hunt for Easter and a campfire with smores.
We have been fortunate to have local police support from the start, with officers attending each week and a donation of games consoles and sports equipment, funded by the Safer Streets Campaign. We also recently received over £700 from the Clifton Bidding Bargain Page which auctions off donations to raise money for local charities. This will further help source new games and equipment.
It’s great to see the young people themselves now coming up with ideas of what they’d like to do and how they’d like things to run and we look forward to how things will develop as young leaders emerge!
As the summer approaches, we hope to have enough volunteers to continue opening through the holidays and we are looking to access more funding to sustain and develop the programme.
If you know a young person aged 11-16, they would be most welcome to come along – we meet each Wednesday evening 6.30-8.00pm (term-time). Or perhaps you’d love to give back to your community and play a part in offering the young people in Clifton a safe and welcoming place to hang out, please do get in touch to volunteer (safer recruitment processes will be followed).
You can find the Youth Café on Tiktok at: Youth.Cafe
Written by Rev Lydia Cartwright- [email protected]