HAVING a cup of coffee and a catch-up is the usual way to end a Sunday morning at church.

But members of the congregation at the Forge Community Church in Debenham will be heading straight to the supermarket this week.

They have decided to spend their own money at the local Co-op to buy food for those in need.

More than 300 members of the church, which meets at Debenham Leisure Centre, will take part in the event after two services on Sunday morning.

As they leave for the Co-op, they will be handed shopping lists with values from �5 to �25, containing anything from tins of soup to packets of toilet rolls.

The food will be bagged up into food parcels and kept in storage and the church will work with local service groups to make sure the food goes to the right people as quickly as possible.

The idea came from Becky Green, the church’s community worker, after hearing stories of extreme hardship.

“It’s hard to think that people in our communities struggle to feed their families,” she said.

“But only last week we donated food parcels to a single mum who was feeding her kids on nothing but oats because she couldn’t afford anything else.”

Forge church leader Duncan Banks said: “It’s just rubbish that some people living on our doorstep can’t afford the basics needed to live.

“It’s not right and we are not going to stand by and ignore it. So we are turning the church inside out by stocking up our food bank ready to help people when they need it most.”