16 March 2018
Methodists encouraged to stay ahead in blood and organ donation
A new survey suggests that while individual church members mayhave a significant interest in donating blood and organs, thebigger picture shows that it is not encouraged by UK churches aspart of their committed Christian giving.
The survey was conducted by Christian Research on behalf of Koreas part of the
The survey shows that close to 10% of Christians have givenblood in the last year compared to 4% of the general population whohave given blood in the last two years, and almost half of allChristians are registered on the NHS Organ Donor Register comparedwith 31% of the general population.
The survey found that 12% of Methodists gave blood in the lastyear, and that 50% are registered organ donors.
However, despite these strong levels of engagement, the overallfindings reveal that many churches in Britain do not yet see bloodand organ donation as a part of their giving, with an extremely low0.3% of respondents stating that either blood or organ donation wasa frequent part of their Churchʼs teaching and over 75% saying thatneither blood nor organ donation was ever mentioned or encouragedby their Church.
The Revd Dr Joanne Cox, Evangelism in Contemporary CultureOfficer, said: "It is encouraging that on some of these measuresMethodists are above the average for Christians as a whole, just asit is that Christians are more likely to be donors. But we can't becomplacent, and what's missing is a discussion of how blood andorgan donation fits into our whole Christian giving. As Methodists,we want to be generous with our time, talents and money, and thiscampaign is good in encouraging us to think wider about what we cangive."
The research also revealed that 70% of Christians alreadyconsider blood and organ donation as a part of their Christiangiving, or are open to the idea, a total that rises to 76% forMethodists.
Sponsored by Give.net and in association with denominations,organisations and festivals including the Church of England,Salvation Army, Methodist Church, United Reformed Church, BaptistUnion of Great Britain, Hope and Evangelical Alliance, thefleshandblood campaign marks the first time NHS Blood andTransplant has worked alongside the Church on a national initiativeof this kind.
Fleshandblood Campaign Director, Juls Hollidge, commented: "TheChurch has always been known for its spirit of generosity. We wantto encourage churches and church leaders to explore what it wouldmean if, alongside all its other great work, the Church were to seeblood and organ donation as a part of that desire to begenerous."
This unique campaign seeks to equip individuals and churches asadvocates for blood and organ donation enabling them to raiseawareness of this key issue with their family, friends andcommunity and potentially help to save thousands of lives eachyear.