Send your MP a letter or card
Writing a card or letter to your MP is a great way to show the work that your church is doing in the community, that you are praying for them in their role and to invite them to a service or event to get to the know them better.
Writing a letter or sending a card
- Can you use paper with a letter-head from your church? Or put the church logo in the top corner? If you choose a card, can you buy one, especially from a local shop or made locally; or ideally, you could hand make one – perhaps created by your youth group or mid week tea and cake group?
- If you send a card, or a letter with an envelope, can you personalise and decorate it? What should be on the front? – Congratulations? Welcome? We are praying for you? – Would they include a hand-drawn picture of the church building? The people of the church, perhaps doing an activity or out in the community? You could feature a local landmark?
- You might want a church leader to sign first, with their title, and then a representative group of people from the church – as many as you can fit on the page!
- You can find the contact details of your MP with the Find my MP tool. This will tell you their email address and postal address in Westminster
- This is a great opportunity to invite your MP to church. You might choose to invite them to an existing service or event. You can also see our guide for Planning a ‘Get to know your MP’ church service if you’d like to involve the MP in a service directly.
Here is a template outline:
‘Dear [name] MP, [most MPs don’t have another form of address, but some might – Use the Find my MP tool to check]
We are [name of church] in your constituency, writing to thank you for the time and energy you give in Parliament to represent [name the constituency, and your local town or area, if you like]. We wanted to let you know we are praying for you and your parliamentary office as you carry out the important duties of an MP. We are a community driven church, passionate about supporting local people and inspired by our faith to work for the common good for all. [Include a couple of sentences about your church, and highlight your social action work and community presence].
We would like to invite you to [detail the service or event you are inviting the MP to. Try to give a few options, at least 3, to best suit the MPs diary. You might want to focus on a special or seasonal service, or community event.; include a brief description, time, date, location, the sort of people expected to attend, and what the MP would be doing; attending and taking part only, asked to speak or present something, host a raffle/prize giving/MC the event, serve the tea and coffee, answer questions, etc. ideally, the different events could feature different levels of participation for the MP to select as they feel comfortable]
We at [name of church] hope you can attend one or more of our events in the near future and look forward to the opportunity for us to better know you as our MP. We ask that you would please RSVP to [give the contact details for the church. Phone number, email, and especially physical address with postcode].
Thank you for reading our [letter/card] and we hope to hear from you soon
[names of signatories, and repeat the name and full address of the church with the postcode – this helps the MP quickly see that you are in their constituency]’
Next Steps
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