The Salvation Army may seem another charity to many, or perhaps even just a typical religious organisation, but I know firsthand the hard work and effort the volunteers and soldiers complete consistently, day by day. 

Once I lived a year in Melbourne, working full-time for the Salvo’s homeless program known as Order 614 – the numbers forming a creed derived from Isaiah 61:4. The amount of work and sense of obligation that each individual member of the Salvos was massive, and rather intense. I frequently witnessed these people work around drug addiction, the marginalised and lonely at all hours of the day and night with so much compassion and so little agenda. 

When you look at an organisation, especially a religious one, you also look at the leaders. While Hillsong leaders may live in splendour and extravagance, I saw a complete opposite with the former international leader of the Salvos, General Eva Burrows, who died last year at 85. She had time for everyone, and sacrificed much in her own life – including marriage and children, I suspect – for the caring of strangers. 

The program in Melbourne may seem far away and irrelevant to Mount Isa, but it’s an international organisation and I know the lieutenants that work in the North West would be of the same frame of mind typical of the Salvation Army. They would work with so much faith, care, love for the people around them with little incentives apart from working towards their individual beliefs, while giving away the social crutches such as alcohol that may cause pain to their clients. The strength these soldiers have is incredible.  

And so I trust in what the Salvos do in the world, the country, and the North West. The money in the Red Shield Appeal goes directly into helping the people around us. They are economical with their funding – I might even go as far as to say shrewd – and know how to make the most out of a little. 

-Chris Burns, Senior Reporter