|PIC1|People may feel under pressure to celebrate the perfect Christmas but the season is also about celebrating the things in life that don’t cost any money, says Christians Against Poverty.

CAP Operations Director Kathryn Foster said many people did not have the same buying power as before the recession but urged people not to resort to credit for Christmas and to instead use their savings.

“As a Christian organisation we want Christmas to be about celebrating Jesus. There are people for whom there are other things that are important at Christmas, like more time at home with the family and more time to relax.

“It’s about all those wholesome and healthy things and celebrating these things is very important too. These are the things that don’t always have to cost money.”

The CAP Money course teaches people across the country how to budget properly, while around 4,500 families across the UK are being helped by the ministry to come out of serious debt. Ms Foster said people often found themselves in debt because of a change in circumstances rather than mismanaging their money.

“There’s a story for every client we help and for many clients life was on an even keel and the credit they had was affordable and manageable but then something happened that tipped that balance and made the debt unmanageable,” she said.

“That can happen to anyone, which means we are above judgement on anyone’s situation.”

She said CAP’s client base had broadened since the start of the recession to include people who had previously lived on sizable incomes or been dual property owners.

“We’ve not had those clients typically in the past but because of redundancy and unemployment this year that has definitely broadened our client base. The housing market crashing has also had an impact.”

CAP plans to open 80 new debt counselling centres in 2010, in addition to its existing 112 centres.

“It’s an ambitious growth plan but it is because we know there is a need,” she said. “Sadly we don’t see the need lessoning. We would love it if our debt management courses got so in the fabric of society that people didn’t need debt counselling any more but we’re a long way off that.”

CAP runs its debt counselling service through local churches. Ms Foster said the church had to be the answer to the nation’s debt problem.

“We work with 112 churches and we know this Christmas they are having an active part in their communities. We know that right now they are out there delivering hampers to our clients and inviting them to all sorts of fun stuff and services and that there are people who won’t be eating a Christmas meal on their own this Christmas because our churches getting out there to make a difference.”

She continued: “The church has to speak out and has to have a voice in its local communities and help people with a very realistic and reliable tool to manage their money.

“Around 150 people work for CAP and the majority of us have been on a CAP money course. The Christian community does need to model that but there are also many active Christians who come to us for help and we make no judgement about that.

“Mistakes happen, life happens and people can find themselves in a mess and it’s about having a compassionate response to that and helping people out of it.”