Community Helping Hands is holding a prayer event for the National Day of Prayer on Thursday in the Gateway Center parking lot. Submitted photo

While Community Helping Hands’s operations may still be on pause, the nonprofit is continuing to look for ways to do community outreach, including through an event coming up this Thursday for the National Day of Prayer.

Carol Hay, Community Helping Hands board president, said the nonprofit does not want the community to forget about them, having been in operation for over 20 years.

“It’s still a nonprofit, we’re just trying to figure out the mission and sustainability piece,” Hay said. “So, as the volunteers talked a little bit about how we can do this, we talked about an outreach into the community. National Day of Prayer seemed like a good day to do this and it’s important to many of the people that work at Helping Hands.”

Community Helping Hands decided to hold a National Day of Prayer activity in the Gateway Center parking lot, 31 Water Street, as a way to give back to the community. The event begins at 11 a.m. with a community prayer, followed by five stations Hay said are known as “prayer stations” which are available beginning at 11:30 a.m. Ministers from throughout the community will be at each of the five stations and offering a more interactive type of prayer activity rather than just sitting and praying.

One station, Hay said, is called “Breathe Prayer”, where people can think about their prayer as they breathe, with two community ministers involved in that station. Another station allows people to foster their creativity with arts and crafts to draw something they are praying for or about. There will be a prayer wall station allowing people to write out their prayer and put it on a wall for others to see.

The event is also a drop-in event, Hay said, so people do not have to come right at 11 a.m. or 11:30 a.m., and can come at an easier time for them, such as if their lunch hour is from noon to 1 p.m.

“It’s nothing that structured but we hope people will drop in and spend as much time as they can,” Hay said.

St Susan Center will also be offering a hot dog lunch for attendees, with the ability to stay and eat at tables or take it to go. Hay said the goal was to make it as user friendly as possible.

Additionally, Hay said National Day of Prayer is a national event, marked on most calendars. She said she believed it is the 75th year of the day being held, corresponding with the upcoming 250th birthday of America.

“So as we observe this National Day of Prayer it’s hope that people will recognize this as significant and we believe that God is stirring the hearts of people all over the nation to increase their prayers for America to help guide and sustain our country,” Hay said.

Prayer is something, Hay added, she feels is important for everyone, especially with current ongoing national events.

“I feel prayer is important in our lives and it is one way that we have of thanking God for the country we have that gives us so many freedoms and choices,” Hay said. “It is a way of expressing gratitude as well as asking that we look closer at what’s happening to all people in our nation and how can we make sure that the freedoms that are promised are part of everyone’s lives.”

Hay emphasized that the event is unstructured and open, and that Community Helping Hands hopes that anyone of any faith will feel comfortable coming to and being included in it. The event is a drop-in event with nothing required of anyone except to come down and talk with people. Besides covering the stations, local ministers will be walking around in the crowd as well.

“So if someone wants specific guidance or individual prayer we can provide that, or we can also provide the opportunity for people to do their own thing and pray as they want to within the prayer stations,” Hay said.